“Two minutes before the first mesh deflector module is ready to activate,” said Aston. “Our missiles hit the countermeasures of the passing ship, sir. No damage likely. I have inconclusive detonation reports from the upper forward and rear missiles. Interceptors out. Shock bomb deployed.”
Under Aston’s command, the battleship’s weapons and countermeasures were ejected in enormous quantities into Ystarn’s atmosphere. Meanwhile, the Maglors automatically tracked their targets and alternated between pounding the sky and then falling silent. The missiles coming from behind were knocked out of the air, while the pursuing ship rose progressively higher. It was falling back as the Fulcrum continued to tear through the sky. Soon the enemy ship’s forward tubes would be reloaded and ready for another launch and Recker wasn’t sure if the battleship would be out of sight in time to avoid the attack.
“The passing ship is turning, sir,” said Burner. “I’ve caught sight of another, six thousand klicks to port and way up high.”
Suddenly, the tactical was displaying far more red than Recker wanted. One on one, and probably one on two, the Fulcrum would smash the Lavorix spaceships into molten wreckage. One versus three were odds too far and Recker needed his battleship to emerge from this with as little damage as possible. And that meant playing the thinking game, as frustrating as it was.
“We’ve been pinged by a second Meklon comms sat,” said Larson.
Recker was hit hard by a realization of his own stupidity. “Damnit!” he yelled. “Tap into the satellite network and use it to locate the enemy ships!”
“On it, sir,” said Burner, sounding just as angry with himself for failing to spot the opportunity.
Less than five seconds later, it was done and the Fulcrum’s tactical began receiving positional data from the Meklon comms network. The first thing Recker noticed was a problem.
“Four enemy ships in the air. We saw four initially and took one out, which means the Lavorix had a fifth somewhere else.”
“Maybe it was slow to exit the subsurface facility,” said Aston. “I guess it doesn’t matter.” She stabbed a finger at her console. “Missiles launched – upper forward and upper rear clusters, one, two and three.”
With the benefit of the positional data, Recker chose a new course that took the Fulcrum away from the closest Lavorix heavy cruiser, which was approaching on a near intercept course from a quarter turn around Ystarn. Missiles continue to fly in both directions and Aston activated the countermeasures as quickly as she could.
“Mesh deflector module one is up and ready,” she said.
“Let’s not use it too soon,” Recker said, angling the Fulcrum so that it followed a snaking chasm that ran for hundreds of kilometres across the surface.
The two directly pursuing warships vanished from direct sensor sight and Recker reduced speed, causing the blue-tinged trail to dissipate, though the hull temperature would take a while to drop from its current 3900 degrees.
A line across the planet’s surface ahead separated day side and night side, and the Fulcrum sped into day. The glittering disc of the Darva-17 star appeared stark and bright as it hung low in the sky. It was a sight Recker would have stopped to enjoy had he not been under such pressure.
Once again, he changed course, hoping to shake off the enemy warships and put clear space between the Fulcrum and the Lavorix. After that, he intended to single out the enemy spaceships and destroy them one at a time, using the Executor or the battleship’s extensive array of other weaponry.
“All four ships have changed course,” said Burner, at the same time as Recker spotted what was happening.
“They’re following us,” said Recker. “Do they have a spotter we haven’t detected?”
“No, sir. Definitely not.”
For a second time, Recker cursed himself for a fool. “The Lavorix are getting data from the comms satellites in the same way we are,” he said. “That explains why they managed to follow us so easily from the surface facility.”
His eyes jumped back to the tactical and he tried to calculate the likelihood of slipping through the converging net of enemy spaceships. The outlook wasn’t good.
“Commander Aston, destroy those satellites,” he said, with a suspicion that the order was far too late to turn the situation around.
“There’s one overhead, sir,” said Larson.
Playing it safe, Aston sent half a dozen missiles into the satellite and Burner declared the target was destroyed. At the same moment, Larson detected another satellite and Aston gave it the same treatment.
Hoping to find some relief, Recker altered course yet again. For three or four seconds, the enemy didn’t react and then they adjusted to follow. Larson detected yet another satellite, this time on the planet’s cusp and Aston fired missiles towards it.
“Damnit,” said Aston. “The furthest enemy has launched interceptors at our missiles. They aren’t going to sit back and let us knock out their advantage.”
“As if they didn’t already have the upper hand,” said Recker angrily.
The Lavorix interceptors destroyed all bar one of the Fulcrum’s missiles and this final warhead struck the comms satellite. Both Aston and Burner confirmed the detonation, but neither could be certain if the satellite was put out of action.
“We’ve got the Executor available again, sir,” said Aston.
Something about the idea of an instant-kill weapon like the Executor didn’t sit easily with Recker, though that wasn’t about to stop him using it to its fullest potential. The moment he heard Aston’s words, he banked towards one of the oncoming heavies, which was low and out of sight beyond the horizon.
Recker’s experience with the Lavorix was that the aliens weren’t pushovers in combat. The commanding officer of the target spaceship must have had a crapload of intuition and a finely tuned sixth sense. Immediately Recker aimed for his ship, the alien threw his own towards the ground, banking in the tightest of curves at the same time.
“Like hell you will,” said Recker.
He activated mode 2 again and the Fulcrum’s engines catapulted it towards the horizon. The nose temperature climbed and the warning alarm sounded again. As soon as the enemy ship came out of its turn, it accelerated with such ferocity that Recker was sure the heavy cruiser’s propulsion was also in an overstressed state.
“Satellite detected,” said Larson. “Due east.”
“Another due west.”
“Targeting missiles. Fired.”
Recker heard the words only distantly, so intent was he on his target. Even with the Lavorix craft at full power, the Fulcrum gained on it quickly and he saw the square shape of its stern in the distance, dancing around mountain peaks in a tactic that Recker had already rejected.
“Commander,” he said.
“Executor locked.” Aston paused for the shortest of moments. “Fired.”
The enemy ship was torn apart by the blast and the sight of it made the thumping pain which gripped Recker’s body seem entirely worthwhile. He hardly spared a moment to watch fifteen billion tons of debris smash with catastrophic force into the surface of Ystarn before he banked once again in the hope of shaking off the pursuit long enough for the Executor to recharge and for the second mesh deflector unit to become active again.
His desires came to nothing. The three Lavorix heavy cruisers kept up the chase – coming closer all the time and Recker was running out of tricks.
Chapter Twelve
For a time which felt like forever, but was in reality no more than a few minutes, Recker did what he could to evade the Lavorix heavy cruisers. The enemy bore all the hallmarks of seasoned veterans and they refused to engage singly. Rather, they attempted to converge so that all three could fight at once and when Recker’s instinctive manoeuvres countered their efforts, they simply dropped back to prepare for another try.
“Time isn’t on our side,” said Aston.
“No,” said Recker. “If these Lavorix haven’t directly contacted the Galac
tar, they’ll have certainly spoken to their base and someone there will decide what reinforcements to send.”
“It’s going to be the Galactar,” said Burner.
“We all know it,” said Recker.
One of the heavy cruisers lifted above the rear horizon long enough to fire a pair of colossal gauss slugs at the Fulcrum. The Lavorix weren’t the only ones with experience and Recker anticipated the move, dropping the battleship so that it was skimming only five hundred metres over the surface and forcing the enemy higher than he’d intended in order to obtain a firing angle.
Recker banked at the last possible moment and the slugs went wide, creating deep, heat-edged furrows in the ground. A booming sound from far above indicated that Aston had got off a missile launch. Sometimes Recker wondered where she got her reactions from.
“Satellite,” said Larson.
“Portside missiles fired,” said Aston.
The other two enemy spaceships also appeared above the horizon and this time the battleship’s facing missile clusters weren’t reloaded. A particle beam activated the mesh deflector and a second came a moment later. With the mesh deflector on cooldown, the beam struck the Fulcrum’s topside armour, briefly turning it stark white. Recker wasn’t sure how much damage his ship had suffered and he demanded a report.
“Our hull is already way too hot,” said Eastwood. He exhaled loudly. “I’ve got a few internal alarms. Not much.”
“Heat resistant design,” said Fraser. “They built heat dispersal cavities like they did in the Axiom.”
“Makes sense for the Meklon to design their ships to counter the weapons of their enemies,” said Eastwood.
Once more, the enemy ships did their best to converge. With the Executor not ready for a discharge, Recker had no killer blow to deliver. He veered left and right, changing altitude both up and down.
“Missiles incoming,” said Aston. “Our own are spoken in return. Interceptor storm out. Waiting to deploy shock bomb.”
A second particle beam plunged into the armour a thousand metres back from the first. A burning patch appeared on the hull and a trail of molten alloy followed the battleship’s flight.
“Shock bomb deployed. Eight detonations from our own missiles. I can’t confirm if they exploded against the enemy countermeasures or against their hull.”
The shock bomb flash in deep red, while Recker kept one eye on the tactical. Swathes of the inbound missiles were destroyed, yet some came on, having evaded the interceptors and the Maglors and having remained operational through the shock pulse.
A warhead detonated somewhere overhead, not far from the first particle beam strike. The distant boom of the explosion was an unwanted and unneeded reminder of how close to defeat Recker was coming.
I’m not going to lose this.
An idea came and, for the third time since coming to Ystarn, Recker was obliged to acknowledge his failings, though on this occasion, he was so invigorated by the potential offered by his plan that he didn’t care. A brief check of the tactical and he spotted an opening which would lead him to his intended destination. Steady hands on the controls turned the warship onto a new heading.
“We’re heading for the base,” he said. “Damn I’ve been stupid.”
“Sir?” said Aston in confusion.
Recker didn’t answer directly. “Lieutenant Burner, do we still have a link to the Meklon base mainframe?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Can we access the surface weapons?”
“I’ll check.” Burner had the answer in moments. “No access to the weapons, sir. I’m hitting the mainframe with the Extinction Protocol override code again.”
“Do it quickly.”
Recker’s convoluted evasive manoeuvres meant the base was only two thousand kilometres away. The Fulcrum was travelling fast but its armour was burning and softened from the heat. A few well-placed missiles or a couple of gauss strikes might yet cause terminal damage. As it was, the battleship had taken more of a beating than Recker had wanted.
A further eruption of stone a dozen kilometres ahead created a dense grey wall across the forward feeds.
“Our nose plates are too soft to withstand so many impacts at this velocity, sir!” said Eastwood in warning.
Recker didn’t want to divert, since the delay would give the pursuers an opportunity to bring down the Fulcrum. Still, he couldn’t risk subjecting his spaceship to so much damage. From the corner of one eye, he saw enemy missiles appear on the tactical and he knew that he couldn’t delay the decision any longer.
“Mesh deflector available!” said Aston.
It was the break which Recker had been looking for. Instead of banking and climbing, he increased power and aimed the Fulcrum into the storm.
“Be ready to activate it manually, Commander.”
The propulsion roared and hundreds of rocks crashed into the plating. On the panel in front of him, Recker saw the velocity gauge climb unhindered and the battleship surged onwards.
“Do it,” he said.
“Activating mesh deflector.”
The familiar shield of bright sword cuts sprang up around the hull. A billion-ton boulder smashed against the deflector, scattering fragments so thickly that it seemed as if the Fulcrum was entirely encased in a moving darkness. Recker thought the mesh deflector would cut out immediately – instead, it held for several seconds as the battleship smashed unstoppably through the maelstrom.
The mesh deflector vanished and the Fulcrum burst out of the heaviest debris. Outside, the view was strange and threatening – rocks flew everywhere and the impacts on the flank and rear armour were a constant drumbeat.
On the forward feed, the visible area of the battleship’s nose resembled a punched-up mess of furrows and ripples. Other boulders crowded the feed, some colliding and shattering, many arcing towards the ground. Instinctively, Recker wrenched the controls, hauling the Fulcrum away from the worst of it. A half-dozen amber lights had appeared on his console, and another flickered between amber and red. He ignored them for the moment, intent on guiding the warship into safety – or whatever passed for safety here on Ystarn.
Soon, the constant impacts had faded to sporadic bursts and the air was noticeably clearer. To Recker’s relief, the inbound missiles were gone from the tactical – destroyed by the aftereffects of the Lavorix’s own weapon. The enemy ships were currently out of sensor sight, but the Meklon satellites had visibility on all three - the heavy cruisers were climbing high over the top of the rising rocks. It wouldn’t be long before the missiles started flying again.
“I need progress on those Meklon ground weapons, Lieutenant Burner,” said Recker, calculating the distance to the surface facility.
“Still trying, sir. It’s not accepting the Extinction Protocol this time. I wonder if the Lavorix have done something to sabotage the security controller.”
“We need access to those emplacements, Lieutenant.”
“I know, sir,” said Burner, undertones of stress in his voice.
The Fulcrum passed back from day into night and, fearing the result of further heat damage, Recker reduced speed fractionally while keeping on course for the base.
“Meklon satellites east and west,” said Larson.
“Missiles locked,” said Aston.
“Hold, Commander! I want the satellites closest to the base left operational.”
“Yes, sir.”
The distance counter fell and Recker diverted his attention between the rocky plains ahead and the brightly glowing trail of orange the Fulcrum was leaving in its wake. Soon, the Lavorix would appear and if Burner didn’t find a way to access the surface emplacements, the fight would be over quickly.
A straight line – the edge of the landing field - ran diagonally across the forward feed and the sensors resolved the shapes of Meklon buildings. In the middle of the landing area, the buckled bay doors weren’t fully open and the gap looked far too small for the Fulcrum to fit inside.
“I
’ve got a sighting of an enemy ship, sir,” said Larson. “Make that two. Coming in fast.”
Fast was an understatement and the Lavorix heavies burned brightly as they streaked across the sky, leaving trails of white. The third appeared, travelling with the same urgency and coming from the east.
“Lieutenant Burner?” asked Recker.
“Sir, the base has handed over launch control for the surface emplacements!” Burner yelled in excitement.
“I’m accessing the ground computer now, sir,” said Aston. “Should take a few seconds.”
“Let’s hope the Lavorix want to keep the Meklon base intact,” said Recker
He guided the spaceship across the base perimeter and cut power to the engines. With its propulsion booming in the air, the Fulcrum came to a halt directly over the opening. A glance at the tactical informed Recker that the enemy were holding fire.
It was not a time for hesitation and he dropped the battleship vertically through the hole. To his relief the Fulcrum went through cleanly with a few metres spare. The dull heat light from the plating created shadows and exaggerated the lines and curves of whatever was inside the subsurface part of the facility.
“The Lavorix aren’t going to let us hide in here without doing something about it, sir,” said Eastwood.
“I know it, Lieutenant. At the very least, we’ve given them a reason to pause.”
The bottom was a surprising distance lower and the shaft widened a thousand metres below the Fulcrum’s current position. Recker piloted the spaceship down and his mind started to make sense of what lay beneath.
“Shit,” he said bitterly, spotting the nose of yet another Lavorix heavy, protruding into view from the left-hand side of the open area below.
“That warship’s engines are at idle, sir,” said Fraser. “But it’s active and ready to go.”
Recker cursed his luck – the Lavorix had evidently sent what they thought was enough firepower to deal with the Fulcrum and had left their final heavy cruiser underground to continue the investigation of the Tri-Cannon. Without knowing exactly what was down below, Recker couldn’t risk firing in case he took out the Tri-Cannon as well.
Fulcrum Gun (Savage Stars Book 4) Page 10