Ghost Fleet

by Isaac Stone

  “Thank you," I told her and sat back down.

  “Anyone else?” Captain asked. No hands or bodies went up.

  “Then can I have a show of hands for all those who will accept these women into the pack?”

  The hands went up slow. A few of the packmates wanted to see which of us would go up first. Tank’s and mine shot up into the air first. More followed and soon every hand in the room was up, although some with reluctance.

  “Any opposed?” Captain asked.

  No hands went up.

  Captain had them all take the oath and pledge while the rest of us looked onward. No one said a word. I could see the pack try to decide how they’d work with this new development. It wasn’t going to be easy, that was assured.

  “I need some help,” she spoke to the pack. “I have uniforms for all these women, but I can’t fit them all on myself. Can some of you come up here and help me?”

  Precious turned and looked at me. I didn’t need to read her mind to know what those eyes said. They told me that she would be very proud if I went up and helped, so I did. After I stood up, so did Imani, and Shaunice after her. Soon, Captain had more help than she needed.

  It was my honor to help Dredge with hers. They’d all decided to keep their names, but Dredge would no longer be called “Queen Dredge”.

  As we greeted the new packmates, Captain made some announcements. “I’m sending them out to their ship with a few men to learn how it functions. We need to know how it’s going to be integrated into the command structure. A few of your new packmates will stay here to help us.”

  The final bit of business involved making the trainees full packmembers. After she’d managed to convince the pack that the former pirate women could be part of our extended family, bringing the trainees in was simple.

  I went up to Captain as everyone filed out that day and thanked her for bringing the new women and at last a few much needed men into the fold. I could tell it wasn’t an easy decision for her, but she’d manage to convince everyone that it was the right thing to do.

  “I'm sure you had a lot of fun with the Grand Marshal when you let him know what you’re about to do,” I told her. “How’d he take it?’

  “I broke the connection when he started to yell about the men being too young and the women being pirate slags,” she replied and walked one of the pirate women over to meet her assignment for the evening. The woman was placed with Tank and Elysian. I was certain that my assignment would include at least one of the new packmates.

  In fact, she scheduled me with Imani and Cierra that evening. We spent most of our quality time discussing Captain’s decision. We were glad it was done.

  It wasn’t for another two days until I saw one of the pirate women’s names appear on the roster next to mine. Since there was still an imbalance, some of us had to be with two women in the evening, but more and more names on the roster were couples only. At least we had the pirate ship to suppliant our fighting capacity.

  I was on my way out of the hanger when Precious met me in the ready room. She had one of the pirate women with her and introduced the woman as my assignment for the evening. As was the custom, she transferred the hand she held to mine and left us alone. I tried not to shudder when I looked down and saw my second assignment for the evening only had three fingers.

  She spent the evening with me in Precious’ room. Thank the stars my paranormal powers helped me probe her mind and find out how to please her. Once I could account for her crude prosthetic leg, and got over the network of scars that criss crossed her torso, being with her wasn’t that much different from any other of the women on this ship. She slept peacefully between Precious and I.

  The brief honeymoon with our new packmates came to an end when Captain received an urgent message from the UDF Navy. Several of the ghost ships were approaching Delios and we needed to return there immediately. The planet had figured into many of our campaigns before, but now it was in danger of complete destruction.

  I found out the first evening Captain assigned me with Dredge and herself. I suspected she wanted me present with her to see how far the healing process advanced. I was the only one on the ship who could travel deep enough into her mind to find out.

  We were relaxing in Captain’s bed when the emergency screen activated and floated down to Captain. She’d been her usual instructor self that night and spend the evening teaching Dredge that it wasn’t necessary to kill a man to enjoy him.

  While Dredge ran her hands through my hair, Captain crawled over to the screen and looked at it. I saw her eyes flare and knew we were about to put our new forces into operation.

  “Problems?" I asked her.

  “A few," she responded. “Two of those ghost ships have destroyed an orbital station near Delios Beta. Thousands of people were in it. Now they’re headed to the planet. At least we’ve got three navy ships to help us because we’re about to go into the thick of it again.”

  “Yaldabaoth," I heard Dredge murmur behind me. I took her hand from my hair and kissed one of the tattoos on it. She ran one finger across my lips.

  Captain slid across the bed and took one of Dredge’s hands in hers. “We’ve talked about that,’ she told her. “I'm counting on you and the women I brought in to bring this terror to an end.” The former cannibal pirate dropped her head.

  “What did you tell me was the one thing you wanted to do?” Captain asked her.

  “To replace the child I killed,” Dredge told her. I watched a tear flow down one of her cheeks.

  “It's still possible to do that," Captain told her. “So, don’t lose hope. But we have to confront that thing first.” Captain let Dredge stroke her arm. “The problem is, most people don’t even know it’s out there.”

  We’d discovered a lot when the three of us merged our minds and saw the nature of the universe. Some things could never be spoken. The bond with Precious and me was very strong. As was the one with Captain. This evening I could feel Precious look into my mind as I made love with Dredge. She wasn’t jealous but wanted to know if the former pirate could express love without hurting someone. She was overjoyed to find out Dredge at least showed the potential for it.

  “We'll be in combat mode as of tomorrow,” Captain explained. “This will change everything. Dredge, you’ll still be on the roster, but it could change on short notice, so be aware of it. I’m not accustomed to sending women out to engage hostiles, so this will be a little different for me. Now, let’s see and him try another position, you need to learn all twelve we use on this ship.”

  I slid my tongue in Dredge’s mouth, which turned out to be a very bad idea, since she still had sharpened teeth.

  7

  Once again, my crew was called out first to deal with the threat from the hostiles. I’d drawn lots with Tank and Dredge after we spent the night together. Funny how a woman who wants to kill and eat you one day can be a loving companion the next. Unless I was mistaking hunger for love, seems like the odds were fifty-fifty.

  We were in the ready room with our crew behind us. Captain decided the former pirate women should fight as one unit for the time being, as they had experienced a lot together. I noted they fell into formation the moment we assembled for the battle order in that room. The three commanders sat across from each other at a small table. My and Tank’s crew had on their armor as we were about to make the jump into the space near the Delios system. The women chose to remain in their pack uniforms, as their ship, the Thunder Horse, instead of their patchwork pirate garb. Captain left the means of deciding who had the glory up to us.

  We’d chosen dice. It was to be the highest number in a roll of three. I sat the dice box down on the table and pulled out as set of dice to use. Of course, I wanted to everyone to be satisfied with the dice, so I set them down on the table.

  “Anyone want to check them for loading?” I asked the pair in front of me.

  “I'm not concerned with Tank cheating me,” Dredge spoke. “We were together recently, and
he didn’t try to fake it once. You can ask Amarin, he made her happy twice after I was done with him.” She reached over and squeezed Tank’s knee, who did his best to keep from laughing.

  All the new inductees were less tense after they’d been through a rotation of the roster, I noted. You tended to be less apprehensive of a person’s motives once you’d slept with them a few times.

  I won the toss.

  The only problem we encountered in bringing the former pirate ship into play was its remoteness. The transport shuttle had to be used to ferry the former pirates to the Thunder Horse.

  In a few minutes, my crew was already locked into place inside the FAS. We waited for the bridge to respond before I let the Thunder Horse know it was time to begin the attack. Once all the vitals on my crew showed green inside my helmet screen, I let them know we were ready to begin the assault.

  “As soon as we leave the hanger,” I told Ely over the audio, “Tank will count to ten and launch his FAS. We’ll attack the ghost ship that’s up ahead on two flanks and allow the women to take it out with their weapons.” The Thunder Horse was equipped with plenty of weapons, but Captain could only spare ammunition for its chain cannons. It still had the lasers, but they might not be effective at range. I suspect Captain, in spite of all the new love energy going around, wasn't quite ready to dive Deathstrike missiles to the former pirates just yet.

  “Captain says make it quick,” Ely told me. “That ghost ship’s already taken out another orbital station. She says to make sure you put a stake in it.”

  I was tossed up against the back of my command tower as the FAS shot out the hanger the moment the doors opened to raw space. Once again, the Hard Rain launched us by use of a rail cannon. We needed to get out there before the ghost ship could respond. It knew the Hard Rain was coming for it and moved to counter our assault.

  Outside the artificial gravity field of the Hard Rain, we were at mercy to the inertia generated by the FAS movement. I tasted blood in my mouth as the force piled on top of me. So far, everyone else was fine, despite what we were up against.

  Even though it was full of incorporeal spirits, the ghost ship was substantial enough on the outside. I’d read over the data sent to us by the last few navy ships that encountered it. The ghost ships had one advantage we couldn’t beat: invisibility. They could allow every bit of radiation on the spectrum, including visible light, to pass through them. They had surprise as an element no one had figure out how to overcome.

  Until today.

  Our helmets were covered with a complicated pattern of lines that Dredge had us decorate them with. According to her, they could overcome the power of the concealment haze that the ghost ships used. They were sigils, as Dredge called them, symbols of power from many ancient cultures, layered over one another to create a complex pattern that negated the anti-spectrum of the spirits and their undead ships.

  “How the hell does that work?” Captain demanded.

  “I don’t know,” Dredge explained. “Someone showed me how to do it a long time ago.”

  “We need to get in touch with that person,” Captain murmured as she looked at the diagram on the table.

  “You can’t,” Dredge announced.

  “Why?"

  “I killed him. He had me hooked on Black Mirror and would teach me while I was in the grip of the drug, cult initiations into the secrets of the mad god inside the Spear Cluster,” Dredge smirked, "Once he let too many days pass without dosing me again and I sobered up enough to ambush him. He took a long time to die."

  By now, we all knew better than to ask for details.

  The ghost ship phased into its stealth mode the moment it realized we were about to intercept it. It took its time heading toward the Hard Rain. We flew in a wide pattern around it, as if we were trying to find the invisible ship. All the time, the etching on our helmets allowed us to see it.

  The moment we detached a power surge toward its front weapons, both Tank and I unleashed a salvo of missiles toward its center. We each banked away in opposite directions the moment they exploded on the ghost ship’s hull, not wanting to be around for what would come next.

  The missiles detonated on the surface of the ship. Not enough to destroy it, but enough to damage the beast enough that it began listing and venting what little atmosphere that remained inside.

  In my rear screen, I watched as the image of the ghost ship faded into plain view. Now it was ripe for targeting.

  I watched the screens as Dredge’s ship moved up into position from behind the Hard Rain. Thunder Horse was a big ship, large enough to hold a set of FAS ships, but a fraction of the size of Hard Rain. There was plenty of room for it to be concealed from the ghost ship. The moment we were dispatched, Thunder Horse moved behind Hard Rain and made sure the bigger starship was between it and the approaching enemy. So, when the ghost ship engaged, it had no way to know that another battleship hid behind Hard Rain.

  The ghost ship attempted to rabbit, but the Thunder Horse already knew where it was going to move next. Tank and I banked away from the location of the ghost ship the moment Dredge and her women opened with the quantum lasers she was still allowed to carry on the ship. She’d wanted the short-range missiles left intact, but Captain drew the line over them. I couldn't see the beams visually, but it was possible to watch as the ghost ship returned to full image and began to suffer from the combined fire of the lasers.

  I watched the pattern of the lasers play out on the enhanced screen. It was important we stay out of her way. Fly too close to a quantum laser beam; get vaporized if the targeting shifts against you. I headed back to the mothership and made certain Tank did the same. Right now, there wasn’t much else we could do.

  “Boss," I heard a voice over the audio, “can you come down here for a moment? You need to look at this.” It was Orlando and he sounded frantic, although he appeared calm in the visual feed.

  There wasn’t a whole lot for us to do now. The Thunder Horse continued to rip apart the ghost ship, which tried to evade the beams directed against it. I had no idea how long Dredge and her crew could maintain those concentrated lasers. One turned off and was replaced by another one. It appeared her power supply had its limitations. Captain and Jalilah went over that ship after it was captured. They were impressed it survived so long considering how it was built. Dredge used the warship more like a FAS, which I realize was part of why she'd been such a deadly foe to the cartels and the UDF. When a ship with that much firepower was pushed to the limits by using it like a starfighter instead of a frigate, it would take a commander equally as daring to counter it, and whatever sentience flew the ghost ship was not her equal.

  With no artificial gravity to hold me, I floated down my tower to see what it was that Orlando wanted me to show me. I knew the AI could handle things, but I’d need to be back up there quick if anything went wrong. Still, I had a few minutes to spare.

  My crew confronted me the moment I reached the bottom of the tower. All of them had their helmets off and stood by the shaft. I was a bit startled when I glanced down and saw the image of Orlando at his station still inside my helmet.

  “What the hell is going on?” I demanded. “Why do you have your tops off in a combat situation? And why does the feed show all of you at your posts?

  Medoro gestured for me to remove my helmet. I surmised something must be wrong and followed his advice. I trusted my crew without question, as we were all family.

  “We don’t have much time, boss,” Tran spoke the moment my helmet was unsealed. I took it off and held it with my right hand.

  “Status?” I asked. In space combat, you don’t have much time to decide or ask for an explanation. The slightest bit of damage can cause venting.

  “Two minutes,” Orlando told me. “Two minutes. We need that much time to voice our concerns.” He looked serious.

  “Concerns?” I asked him. “About what?”

  Then it hit me. “You disabled the audiovisual feeds and put them on a loop!�
�

  “Had to do it,” Medoro joined in, “There’s no other way to talk to you in private. The ship monitors everything while we’re out here. We figured out a way to take us offline.”

  I was furious.

  “Chance we had to take, boss,” Orlando told me.

  “What is so important you would risk the lives of everyone to talk to me in private?”

  “Captain,” Tran filled in. “We’re concerned about her. She’s made some scary decisions as of late. We needed to voice our concerns now since you seem the closest to her.”

  I lowered my eyes at the three of them. “You don’t want to start down this path.”

  “We all love Captain,” Tran continued. “All of us. But we’re worried about her. She’s brought that girl Precious into the pack, for one. I was willing to let it go, but then she brought in those crazy pirate women.”

  “Captain's word is law,” I reminded him. “And we all voted those women into the pack.”

  “We were afraid not to,” Orlando brought up. “Some of us have had second thoughts about what we did. Especially after sleeping with them. Those women aren’t right in the head. There’s a reason they have shoot-to-kill orders on them from several systems.”

  I’d slept with Dredge, but I had an ability that made it easier than the others to cope with her. I hadn’t had much experience with the other women, other than the brief mind probes. I needed to make sure Captain had me on the roster with more of them when we got out of this mess.

  “I'll talk to Captain about your concerns,” I spoke. “But you don’t need me to talk to her; anyone of you can request an audience with Captain. Stars and stones, why don’t you see if you can get her to put all of you on the her roster slot? That way you’d have most of the evening to spend with her.” It seemed like a reasonable way to go about it.