by Jay Allan
Or as close to safety as she could get on a tiny ship in the middle of a titanic battle.
* * *
“Full power to the engines. The fleet is withdrawing, and it’s time to follow.” Sonya Eaton sat on Colossus’s cavernous bridge, snapping out orders to the aides gathered around her. It was a bit primitive, in a way, for her to rely on so many human officers when so many of her orders required the advanced number crunching of the computer systems, but she was more comfortable dealing with other people than directly with an electronic interface.
The old imperial AIs that had run the vessel, and likely interacted very closely with its captain, were a part of the ship that had not been restored. The Rim powers and the Hegemony had made great strides in information technology utilizing recovered imperial artifacts, but no one had matched the great sophistication of the empire’s old thinking computers.
Colossus was still fighting, its massive weapons lancing out, cutting into the closest elements of the Highborn fleet. The enemy was badly strung out, the result of Barron’s aggressive move against the attack forces moving into the system, and Clint Winters’s unexpected assault on the flanking force. There were still enough Highborn ships in the system to obliterate every vessel under Barron’s and Winters’s commands, Colossus included, but it would take hours, perhaps days, to reorder them sufficiently to launch an organized assault.
That fact gave the fleet its chance to escape, and Colossus and Excalibur and a small line of heavy ships were safeguarding that operation, fighting one rearguard action after another. But now, it was time to break off…and to follow the rest of the fleet through the point. There were Highborn ships close enough to follow, to prolong the fighting, but not enough to stop the withdrawal. The fleet had advanced right into an ambush…and though a series of near-miracles, it had escaped, even caught part of the enemy in a trap of sorts.
Now it was time to get out. The Pact couldn’t spare Colossus or Excalibur. If any Highborn followed closely behind, the ships that had already transited would overwhelm and destroy them. With any luck, the fleet would make it all the way back to Striker without suffering further losses.
What happened then would depend on what the enemy did, whether the shaky stalemate continued…or the Highborn forces reorganized themselves and came right at the fortress, initiating the battle that could very well decide the war once and for all.
Eaton had a good enough grasp on all that to be glad it was Tyler Barron’s problem, and not hers. Her job was starker, simpler. Get Colossus out of harm’s way before it suffered any more damage…and be ready for whatever came next.
* * *
Andi felt her hands clench even as she let out a loud yell. She’d been watching three Highborn fighters close with Pegasus for the past few minutes and now, thanks to Ross Tarnan in the topside turret, there were only two.
Pegasus was no warship, but her guns were heavier than those carried by a one-man fighter, and that advantage might just save Andi and all her people. The ship didn’t look like a militarily significant target—though if the enemy had any way of knowing the wife of the Pact’s senior admiral and the pilot who commanded all the fighter wings, were both onboard, she suspected half the enemy fleet would be chasing her down. Instead of three fighters.
Two fighters…
Still, danger was danger, and either of the remaining attack craft could seriously damage Pegasus if it got into range and scored a hit. Andi’s spontaneous effort to save Reg Griffin had worked. The pilot was injured and unconscious, but she was going to be just fine.
Unless they all got blasted to atoms.
Andi had paused for a few seconds, torn between rushing to the bridge…or down to the bottom turret. It was a question of navigation versus fighting…and as much as she acknowledged Vig’s abilities as a pilot, if Pegasus was going to make a mad dash to save all their lives, she’d decided she had to be at the controls. They had to escape those interceptors pursuing them, but they were never going to survive just fighting. The more time that elapsed, the likelier it was that more enemy fighters would engage.
“Lex…I need that power now. I don’t care if the damned reactor melts, as long as it gets us the hell out of here.” She worked the controls even as she spoke, pouring all her piloting skill into trying to shake Pegasus’s pursuers. She’d planned to head back through the Confederation wings, wildly transmitting the beacon that identified Pegasus as a friendly. But the fighters had suddenly broken off, and they’d blasted back toward the battleships at full thrust. She understood at once. Tyler had issued a withdrawal order. She’d even smiled for a few seconds. Maybe Clint Winters’s intervention was actually going to work. She dared to imagine she had helped in her way to save the fleet. To save Tyler.
But the withdrawal left Pegasus far more exposed than she had been. Her ship was fast, assuming the already-tortured reactor and engines could take even more abuse, but if the enemy wanted her badly enough, they could catch her.
She slammed her fist down in her lap in frustration as one of Tarnan’s shots went just wide of the closest fighter. She was frustrated her gunner had only taken down one of the enemy ships, but she knew that wasn’t fair. She had enough firsthand experience to understand just how difficult it was to hit a fighter.
“You’ve got all the power I can coax out of her, Andi…and I can’t guarantee when she’s going to give up the ghost entirely.”
Andi just nodded, and she jerked her head abruptly to the side, shaking off some of the sweat that had been pouring down her face. She nudged the acceleration higher…and then even higher. Pegasus had never let her down…and she was willing to bet the day that would change had not yet come.
It was going to be a race now, a desperate run to the transit point, following the fleet as it retreated…with all the might of the Highborn right behind her.
She would either make it, or she wouldn’t, and there was nothing to be gained about thinking about it any deeper, or pondering what ifs.
She pushed the controls even farther forward, and Pegasus began to shake wildly as the vessel blasted out more thrust than it even had before.
Fifty-fifty.
Despite her best efforts, Andi hadn’t been able to stop herself from estimating their chances.
Though she thought her numbers might be a touch optimistic…
* * *
“What exactly, Admiral Winters, was unclear about my orders for you to remain at Striker, no matter what?” Tyler Barron’s voice was rough and raspy, but he suspected his second-in-command would sense the lack of any real anger in it almost as quickly as Atara had. Dauntless had transited along with the rest of the fleet, and they were all enjoying a passing moment of relative safety.
“Well, Admiral…I just figured it made more sense to mutiny than it did to allow the Pact to lose it’s top admiral. Besides, your wife would have had my hide if I hadn’t set out with the whole fleet.”
“Andi…you saw Andi?” Barron hadn’t heard a word about Pegasus, or any update on the status of Andi’s mission.
“Yes…she came back to Striker. She was the one who told us about the ambush the Highborn were planning. She is why we’re here, Tyler. She’s a force of nature, that one.”
“She is, indeed, my friend. So, let’s say you get a pass on insubordination, just this one time.” Somehow, Barron doubted it would be the last time. “Is Andi back at Striker?”
The silence on the line told Barron all he needed to know, and it confirmed his worst fears.
“She wouldn’t stay back, Ty. I tried to get her to come with me on Excalibur, but…”
“She brought Pegasus out here?” Barron turned, his eyes moving to the display, and then to Atara. He hadn’t seen Andi’s ship, not in Beta Telavara and not among the retreating fleet units still trickling through the transit point. He’d almost let himself feel relief at the number of ships that had made it out, but now there was only a void, and a deep, yawning worry about where a single free trader
was, a tiny ship that had no place in a battle like the one just ended.
He felt a flash of anger at Andi, at her recklessness, but it was immediately washed away by guilt and fear. “Atara…”
“No sign of Pegasus, Tyler…not yet.” A pause. “But there are still ships coming through.”
Barron appreciated Atara’s effort, but he knew the fleet couldn’t wait much longer. He’d left the Highborn forces in massive disarray, and he was fairly certain he had time to get his fleet out of harm’s way, to return to Striker before the enemy could conduct a true pursuit. As long as they didn’t waste any time.
Could he leave…without knowing? Without waiting for Andi’s ship to return?
If she returns…
He’d tried to clamp down on that last thought, but it had slipped out anyway.
He sat, silent, still, almost in a state of shock, and he watched the minutes slip by, then an hour, two. The flow of ships transiting from Beta Telavara slowed…and then it stopped. He knew there were still ships back there, crippled vessels that would never escape. He’d done everything he could to rescue those crews, and many of his ships were packed with refugees, survivors of vessels that had been left behind.
Was Pegasus one of those ships? Or had it been…
Every second passed in agonizing slowness, and with every one of them, Tyler Barron’s spirit sank. He could feel his hope slipping away, and in the part of his mind that wore his admiral’s stars, he knew he had to give the order, to pull the fleet away from the point, and set a course back to Striker.
He could feel wetness in his eyes, and he struggled to remain cool, emotionless. His people needed their admiral, not a heartbroken husband…and the billions on the Rim needed the navy to stay in the fight, to hold back the enemy that would turn them all into slaves and supplicants. It was bigger than any one man, any one woman. No matter how much he loved Andi, he was a prisoner, to his heritage and his duty.
And now he had to leave, to pull away, not even knowing what had happened to her.
“Atara…” He managed to speak the name, but the order he had to give proved more difficult. He hesitated, took a deep breath, and said, “The fleet will head toward the exit point at full thrust.”
“Yes, Adm…Tyler, the display!”
Barron’s head whipped around, and he could see the energy spike from the transit point…and a single ship emerging into the system. For an instant the scanners offered nothing more than a location. But then the stats began to flow in…mass, dimensions, thruster output. They were all familiar, deeply, gratifyingly familiar.
“It’s Pegasus!”
Barron hadn’t needed Atara to tell him that, but he was grateful for the confirmation nevertheless.
He could see that Andi’s ship was damaged, that its thrust was barely half its normal levels. But that, he could do something about.
“Atara…fleet order. All ships, proceed to Fortress Striker at full thrust.” He turned and leaned over his comm. “Clint, you’ve got fleet command right now. Get our people out of here.” He tried to hold back a smile, without real success. “I’ll be right behind you.”
Back to Atara: “Let’s lock the approach beacons on Pegasus, Atara. It’s time to get that ship docked and get the hell out of here.”
Chapter Forty-Three
Forward Base Striker
Vasa Denaris System
Year 327 AC (After the Cataclysm)
“You can’t go away again. No!” Cassie stared at Tyler Barron with an insistent frown on her face. Barron knew her words came only from her love for him, and for Andi, but they cut him like a knife. He wasn’t going anywhere, that much he could promise her. But she was.
The invasion had failed, and if Andi’s and Clint Winters’s intervention had averted total disaster, there was no question of any renewed offensive. The campaign had proven beyond doubt that the Highborn forces were vaster than even the most aggressive estimates…and the enemy fighters had proven to be as effective as feared. Tyler Barron knew what he had to do. He had to get ready, prepare to meet the Highborn once again in battle, this time in defense of Fortress Striker…to hold the path back to the Rim and to the Confederation itself.
He was still unsure about tactics, deployments, just about everything he would have to have ready. But he was sure of one thing. Cassiopeia Barron would be nowhere close to the fortress when it became the center of a monumental battle. He knew very well his daughter’s future rested in many ways on the outcome of the war, but he was damned sure not going to allow her to be anywhere she’d face immediate danger.
“You can’t go either! Promise me!” Barron winced as his daughter turned toward Andi and unleashed a barrage with the same brutal severity her mother was wont to direct at those who stood in her way. There was no way to explain to a five year old child, even one as intelligent and incisive as Cassie, why her parents had to send her away. ‘We love you, which is why we can’t be with you’ was a difficult argument to make to a child, no matter how intelligent she was, or how true the words were.
“We will talk about it later, Cassie. For now, let’s just spend some time together.” Barron had precious little time to spare, he suspected, but just then, he would settle for a few quiet hours, just the three of them. He knew he had to speak with Andi as well, discuss her intentions to leave almost immediately for the Badlands, to seek out the phantom weapon the empire had supposedly used to defeat the Highborn. Barron didn’t doubt such a resource existed…but it was too tenuous a goal to justify watching Andi leave yet again.
At least she won’t be going into enemy space this time.
Though if we can’t hold here, everything might be enemy space…
Barron pushed it away, with all the force he could muster. He had a few weeks, days even, with his family, and he wasn’t going to let anything ruin that.
War would come again soon enough, and he would be there to meet it, as he had always been.
* * *
“Andi, I don’t know what to say. Thank you.” Reg Griffin was propped up on a pile of pillows, staring right at the door as Andi stepped into her hospital room. The pilot had been injured, though not severely, and by all accounts, she would be out of the hospital the next day, and back on duty in less than a week.
“It was just dumb luck that we were so close. What happened, anyway?” Andi felt almost immediately as though she’d blurted out too much. She hadn’t believed any Highborn pilot could match Griffin, but she didn’t want to exacerbate Reg’s self-recriminations.
“There is this pilot…he’s good, Andi, really good. Unlike anything I’ve seen before.” A pause, then: “No, that’s not exactly true. He flies just like…” Reg hesitated again, and Andi moved over to the side of the bed, looking down and waiting silently until her friend continued.
“He flies like Jake Stockton. The way Jake…did…”
Andi didn’t know what to think of what she was hearing. Her first instinct was usually to doubt almost anything she heard, but Reg Griffin wasn’t the unreliable sort. Of course, the pilot had been through a lot.
“Could it be coincidence? Or, maybe they studied their own scanner records from the early battles, when Jake was still…” Andi looked down at the floor, and the two remained silent for a moment. Then she stared back at Reg. “I just wanted to stop and see you, because I’m leaving in the morning. I think we found something that will help fight the Highborn…but it’s still just a trail, not an actual weapon yet.”
She leaned forward and put her hand on Reg’s shoulder. “Don’t let this enemy pilot get into your head, Reg. Tyler’s going to need you.” She forced out a smile she couldn’t imagine looked anything less than fake, and then she turned and walked out of the room.
She had twelve hours before Pegasus was heading out, one evening and night, and she was damned sure going to spend it with Tyler and Cassie.
Then she was going to leave them again…to go out there and find a way to save them both.
* * *
“We likely accomplished one thing. We’ve proven to the Senate the importance of continuing to support the war effort. They can’t look at the reports and the scanner footage we sent down the pipe and not realize the magnitude of the danger.” Barron didn’t much care for the slang title that had already attached itself to the string of relay stations that vastly reduced communications time to and from Megara. But it was easier to call the thing the ‘pipe’ just like everyone else was doing than it was to try to fight a trend that had already taken hold. Barron was just glad to have the thing operative, and the reduction in two way communications time from six months to just a couple weeks had all kind of tactical implications.
Including a few he imagined might come back to bite him. He’d dealt with the Senate long enough to realize there were times when a solid lag in communications was a blessing.
“You accomplished much, Tyler, and you have my profound thanks. Our great test still goes on, the struggle for survival, for freedom looming as tall as ever. But the enemy suffered considerable losses as well, including many in their new fighter wings. That, at least, is a good thing.
The massive battles the Pact fleet had just fought would serve Akella even more usefully than him. The Senate would be scared to death, but they were far enough away that they might focus some of that against him, place the blame on their senior admiral. The Hegemony Council was too close to the action for that kind of nonsense. If Striker fell, the chance to hold onto the rest of the Hegemony would almost certainly be lost. The once-mighty Masters would be reduced to refugees, likely housed on Megara in considerable comfort but with a status lying somewhere between guests and well-tended prisoners. Even Thantor had backed off on his attacks on Akella, and her position as Number One seemed secure, at least for the time being.