Fighting For The Crown (Ark Royal Book 16)

by Christopher G. Nuttall

  Although if the virus did have millions of battleships, the war would be over by now, he acknowledged, privately. They could trade battleships for starfighters and still come out ahead.

  “Captain,” Staci said, formally. “We are ready to make transit.”

  Mitch nodded, curtly. “Helm, take us through.”

  “Aye, Captain.”

  The display ticked down to zero, then blanked. Mitch felt something insubstantial hit his chest, as if he’d been hit without actually being hit. He gritted his teeth as the display hastily rebooted, knowing that they were within seconds of being blown to hell if there was an enemy squadron in firing range. They’d stepped down everything as much as possible when they’d readied themselves to make transit, but the cloaking device would have fluctuated the moment they jumped. If there was someone close enough to see them, they were dead.

  “Captain,” Staci said. “No active contacts detected within sensor range.”

  Mitch allowed himself a moment of relief. The display was filling rapidly, showing the positions of the primary star, a couple of planets and a handful of comets and asteroids. There was no sign of the enemy fleet, although he knew it had to be lurking somewhere between Tramline One and Tramline Two. The virus had tried using the system to stage an attack on New Washington, although it had added several weeks to its deployment time. In hindsight, Mitch suspected the virus had been really clearing the way to the catapult system. It had certainly taken pains to obliterate any human presence between Falkirk and New Washington. If anyone was still alive, it was unlikely they’d answer hails.

  “Helm, take us on our planned course,” he ordered.

  “Aye, Captain.”

  Unicorn picked up speed, heading towards Tramline Three. The system had been largely classed as useless, back when it had been surveyed. The Americans hadn’t known about alien-grade tramlines until the First Interstellar War. Even afterwards, the system hadn’t been particularly useful. The tramline chain jumped from desolate star to desolate star until it finally terminated in the catapult system. Mitch had studied the reports, from the survey missions. If they’d missed something, it was very well hidden indeed.

  He took a long breath as his ship circumvented the system. It was unlikely they’d be detected unless they got very unlucky, but they had to be careful. There was no hint the virus knew they’d detected the catapults, yet ... Mitch shook his head. They had to take the catapults out, if they couldn’t capture them. Leaving them in place would allow the virus to turn humanity’s flank and win the war. Mitch had no illusions about the outcome, if the virus got into bombardment range of Earth. The virus would take root and spread so rapidly it couldn’t be stopped. The human race would be cruelly and irrevocably doomed.

  The display continued to update. Mitch frowned as the passive sensors finally picked up the alien ships. They were closer to Tramline Two than he’d expected, but far enough from his position for him to be reasonably sure he wouldn’t be detected. He puzzled over the positioning for a moment, then decided the virus was waiting to see which way the human fleet intended to go. It was well-positioned to either slow the admiral down or break contact long enough to rendezvous with reinforcements further up the chain.

  A shame the admiral doesn’t intend to engage the fleet, Mitch thought. We could sneak up and open fire before they even knew we were there.

  He stood. “XO, inform me when we approach the tramline,” he ordered. “You have the bridge.”

  “Aye, Captain,” Staci said. “I have the bridge.”

  Mitch wished, not for the first time, for a ready room of his own. It would have been nice to have a dedicated office right next to the bridge, although his cabin was only a few short metres away. Unicorn was too small to devote two compartments to the commanding officer, let alone anyone else. Mitch opened the hatch, then keyed his terminal to bring up the in-system display. It was reassuringly clear. If there was anything close enough to prove dangerous, his ship couldn’t see it.

  Which is meaningless, he reminded himself, as he sat on his chair and brought up the final list of messages from Earth. They can’t see us either.

  He frowned as he scanned the list. A handful of all-ships updates, none marked urgent ... he made a mental note to go through them when he had a spare moment. They would have been flagged if there’d been something important, something that demanded immediate attention, but ... he shook his head. The beancounters back home would bitch and moan if he didn’t read their messages, even if they had a funny idea of what was important. It was all too clear they didn’t have any naval experience of their own.

  Idiots, he thought, with a twinge of contempt. I’d sooner die than be trapped behind a desk.

  He put the thought out of his head as he read through the final messages. A bundle of e-newspaper subscriptions, forwarded from Earth. They dated back several months, suggesting the newspaper had decided to err on the side of thoroughness. Mitch had downloaded two thirds of the collection shortly before the fleet had made transit. A couple of messages from his family, an invitation to a party that had been and gone before he’d even seen the invite and ...

  Mitch blinked. Charlotte sent me a message?

  He frowned as he read the header. Charlotte really shouldn’t be sending him anything, beyond - he supposed - another invitation to the estate. She was a military wife. She had to know how unlikely it was that Mitch would be able to visit on short notice, even if he hadn’t been serving with her husband. It crossed Mitch’s mind to wonder if she had other lovers, other men - or women - in her life. It was far from impossible. The days when aristocratic women and princesses were locked up in towers and guarded by eunuchs were long gone. She didn’t have to court disaster by messaging him. God alone knew how many filters the message had passed through before it had finally reached Unicorn.

  Charlotte’s face filled the screen. “Captain Campbell,” she said, with heavy formality. Too heavy. “I trust this message finds you well. It is my pleasure to invite you to my daughter’s coming out ball, to be held when her father returns from deployment. We would very much like to see you there.”

  She grinned, then lifted her shirt. Mitch stared, feeling a rush of arousal even though he knew she was light-years away. She was as bold and daring as himself, perhaps even more so ... it occurred to him, in a moment of insight, that Charlotte would have made a great frigate captain. She had nerve and yet ... he wondered, as Charlotte kept talking, if she truly understood what she was doing. He kicked himself a moment later. Of course she knew what she was doing. She’d grown up in the aristocracy.

  Mitch swallowed, hard, as the message came to an end. Charlotte was no coy ingénue, no teenage girl unsure of what she wanted; Charlotte knew what she wanted. And she had no qualms about reaching for it. Mitch was torn between admiration, concern and desire. There was something about her that made him want her ... it was exciting, in a way, to have a woman take the lead. And there was a thrill that came with sleeping with a married woman.

  He reached for the terminal, then shook his head. There was no point in recording a reply, not now. It would just sit in the buffers until Unicorn linked up with the fleet, then remain in their buffers until the fleet returned home. Charlotte would probably get a dozen copies of the same message, if her inbox wasn’t configured to detect and erase duplicates. It wasn’t easy to trust online services, these days. There was no way to be sure a hacker wasn’t screwing with the system.

  Mitch stood, checked the terminal to make sure there was nothing that demanded his immediate attention and walked to the bed. It was small, barely large enough for a grown man. He’d known captains and admirals who would have thrown fits, if they were given such a small cabin and a tiny bed. Mitch snorted at the thought. Frigates just didn’t have the room for anything bigger. He was lucky he wasn’t sharing a cabin with his XO.

  He found himself thinking of Charlotte, time and time again, as the ship continued her plodding way down the chain. There were n
o enemy contacts, not even a handful of freighters or warships making their way towards the catapults. Mitch was tempted to wonder if they’d been sent on a wild goose chase, although he knew it was unlikely. No one would devote so many starships to a giant waste of time. That only happened in bad movies and yet ... it was possible, he supposed, that the admiral really intended to break into Alien-One and open the tramlines to the interior. No, she wouldn’t have sent his ship so far away unless she thought it was worthwhile ...

  The thought gnawed at his mind as Unicorn transited into the final system. Mitch felt trapped, even though he knew it wasn’t so. There was no reason to believe they were being tracked, let alone that they couldn’t break contact and return through the tramline somewhere else. And yet, the thought bothered him. There was only one way in and out of the catapult system. It was easy to feel the door was slamming closed behind him.

  “Captain,” Staci said. “Long-range sensors are detecting thirty gravimetric sources.”

  Mitch stared at the display. “Thirty?”

  “Yes, Captain,” Staci said. “The spooks got it wrong.”

  “Or they assembled an additional ten catapults between the survey mission and our arrival,” Mitch said. He would have preferred to believe the spooks were wrong. “Deploy probes as planned, then hold us here.”

  “Aye, Captain.”

  Mitch felt ice wash down his spine as more and more data flowed into the display. The catapults didn’t look like catapults, certainly nothing like the conical device humanity had built to win the Second Interstellar War. They looked like giant spheres, each one a framework large enough for an entire fleet to nestle in. Mitch silently calculated just how many ships the catapults could hurl at Earth and shuddered at the answer. The virus could put together a fleet twice as large as Admiral Onarina’s and practically teleport it to Earth.

  And that would be the end, he thought. They have to be stopped.

  His eyes moved to the cluster of warships holding position near the giant catapults. A fleet carrier, a trio of battleships, a handful of smaller ships and a brainship ... he allowed himself a moment of relief. The fleet wasn’t strong enough to punch through Earth’s defences, let alone stand up to Admiral Onarina. The virus was still laying its plans, then. It wasn’t on the verge of launching the invasion. And yet ... he frowned, stroking his chin. There was something about their formation that bothered him. He couldn’t put his finger on it.

  “Captain,” Lieutenant Jolly said. “I believe that nineteen of the catapults are ready for service.”

  Mitch frowned as a thought struck him. “Has their fleet already made transit?”

  “I don’t believe so, sir,” Jolly said. “There’s no hint they’re refurbishing the catapults after use.”

  “Good,” Mitch said. The original catapult had destroyed itself, spectacularly, after launching a human fleet into the enemy rear. The design had been improved, over the years, but even the latest catapults required such heavy refurbishment after use that no one considered them a worthy investment. The Royal Navy had applied, repeatedly, for permission to build one and the government had always refused. “Can you isolate their control nodes?”

  Jolly worked his console for a long moment. “I think so, sir,” he said. There was a hint of waspishness in his tone. “There’s no way to be entirely sure.”

  Mitch nodded. If nothing else, taking out the catapults would force the virus to start again from scratch. It probably had the persistence to do just that, particularly as it didn’t have to explain its expenditures to beancounting bureaucrats, but it would give the human race a chance to start dropping BioBombs on every infected world. And put newer and better weapons into mass production. Mitch had seen the reports. There were all sorts of interesting ideas in the pipeline.

  He keyed his console, bringing up the planned schedule. Admiral Onarina was no fool. She’d worked a great deal of leeway into the operational planning, pointing out that a fleet could hardly operate like a monorail. If everything had gone according to plan, there would be four days before Unicorn needed to return to the RV point and link up with the rest of the fleet. Mitch assumed Admiral Onarina had contingency plans for what she intended to do, if Unicorn never returned. He frowned as he looked back at the display. In her place, he would send two ships. And he’d make sure neither one knew about the other. The virus made a mockery of basic security precautions. Who knew what it might learn from capturing and infecting an entire crew?

  “We’ll keep our distance,” he said. The virus didn’t seem to be sweeping space as carefully as he would have done, if he was in command of the alien fleet, but there was no point in taking chances. It was quite possible space was seeded with hundreds of passive sensor platforms. The slightest glimmering of Unicorn’s presence might be enough to bring the entire fleet down on her. The brainships were fearsomely good at turning a tiny sensor contact into a full-scale targeting solution. “I want everything noted and logged before we go.”

  “Aye, Captain.”

  Mitch nodded as he watched the display. He was no stranger to megaprojects - he’d watched giant fleet carriers and battleships take shape in the yards - and yet the sheer scale of the alien project stunned him. Thirty catapults? Even the virus had to quail at the thought of such a vast investment. It had to be running up against some pretty hard limits ... surely. His skin crawled as it started to sink in. The virus wasn’t just inhuman. It was ... something terrible. The folks back home didn’t know the true scale of the threat or they would have panicked and ...

  Perhaps that’s why Charlotte threw herself at me, he thought. Charlotte played host to all sorts of government and military personnel. She might know the truth, even if the general population didn’t. Hell, she might even know where the fleet was going. She wanted to have fun before the world came to an end.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Admiral?”

  Susan jerked awake, half-convinced she hadn’t been asleep at all. The flight from New Washington to the RV point had been a long slow crawl, enlivened only by a suggestion the fleet should feint at the alien blocking force before heading for the target star. Susan had overruled the officers who’d wanted to be aggressive, despite every instinct insisting they shouldn’t leave such a fleet in their rear. The alien ships didn’t have enough firepower to take her fleet, unless they’d invented something completely new, but they could harass her or take out the catapults to keep them from falling into her hands.

  She rubbed her eyes as the lights brightened. “What?”

  “Unicorn just made contact,” Commander Elliot Richardson said. “She’s transferring her sensor logs now.”

  Susan stood, grabbed her uniform trousers with one hand and hastily pulled them on. “I’m on my way,” she said. “Put the coffee on.”

  “Aye, Admiral.”

  Susan took a moment to compose herself as she finished dressing, feeling a twinge of the old anticipation running through her. She might not be in command of a ship, but she was about to take an entire fleet into combat. Too much rode on the mission’s success for her to be sanguine about the outcome, yet ... she calmed herself with an effort as she ran her hands through her hair. She’d cropped it close to her scalp when she’d been a junior officer, only letting it grow out after she’d reached command rank. She kicked herself, mentally, for not cutting it short before departure. Right now, it only got in her way.

  She glanced at herself in the mirror, then walked through the hatch and onto the CIC deck. Her aide already had a steaming mug of coffee in his hand, ready for her. Susan took it, nodded her thanks and hurried to the big display. Unicorn had done well and yet ... Susan felt her heart sink as she realised just how many catapults were under construction. The virus could throw its entire fleet at Earth, if it wished ...

  And there could be more, deeper within enemy space, Susan mused. She was familiar with the basic economic calculus - it was the only way to avoid fantasy fleet syndrome - but the virus made a mockery
of it. How many catapults can it afford?

  She dismissed the thought as she studied the live feed. The fleet outnumbered and outgunned the defenders, but ... the defenders would have a chance to destroy their own catapults rather than risk them falling into human hands. The devices were incredibly flimsy, if the sensor records were accurate. A handful of nukes would be more than enough to put them beyond repair. Susan knew she might hesitate, if she was asked to blow away trillions of pounds of investment, but she doubted the virus would react in quite the same way. It would just do it and worry about the costs later. She shook her head in dismay. The virus seemed to have too many advantages.

  “There’s no hint of any settlements on the planet,” Richardson said. “If there’s a black colony, it’s keeping very quiet.”