Admiral's Challenge (A Spineward Sectors Novel: Book 8)

by Luke Sky Wachter

  “Second Destroyer off the starboard bow!” shouted the Sensor Officer.

  “Helm, spin us around to keep us pointed at the new contact. Don’t let him off our bow; I don’t care how much you have to hotdog our engines—keep them off our tail!” shouted Captain Iorghu. If they couldn’t keep the new raider off their stern, they would soon lose their engines and be left adrift.

  “Sir, Captain Steelbender is protesting the change in our facing. He says you’re leaving him and the other corvette to handle an Imperial Destroyer all by themselves,” reported Coms.

  “Bender can do his blasted job—which is to protect his side of the convoy and leave me to do mine,” Costel snapped and then thrust a finger at the second Destroyer. “Focus fire on the new Destroyer; we can’t let her get in close or she’ll rip the convoy apart.”

  “On it, Captain,” Tactical said professionally.

  “Captain, the first enemy contact is moving to cross the T of the convoy. Our corvettes are falling back, Sir!” yelled Sensors.

  “Cowards! And they dared to call us—” Costel started, just before an explosion rocked the stern of one of the freighters.

  “The Brilliant Cargo Gem just lost her primary engine. She says they just got their secondary engine back working again but she’s going to have to slow down even further,” the Comm. Officer reported tensely.

  “What rotten luck,” Captain Iorghu cursed. First, the Brilliant Cargo Gem had reported an engine misfire and shut down their secondary engine, thus slowing the entire convoy. Now, no sooner had they regained use of their secondary than the main engine was knocked out of commission by pirates. That ship really had no luck, and it was dragging the rest of them down with her.

  “What are your orders, Captain?” his XO asked urgently.

  Iorghu slammed his fist down on the arm of his chair. “We can’t slow down. If we can’t get this convoy out, Prometheus will be cut off from the rest of the galaxy. We have to get through and let the rest of the Sector know that this situation is rapidly spiraling out of control!” he made the decision and said flatly. Who would have thought just a few months ago that a pirate operation could become so powerful that it literally threatened to embargo the entire Promethean Star System?!

  Every time merchant ships went out, they were attacked. It had gotten to the point that independent shippers—and even some local Promethean merchant outfits—had abandoned trade with the home world all together. If this convoy didn’t make it, he didn’t know what would happen to Prometheus.

  Anything smaller than a battleship was being cut off and chopped down and, unfortunately for this convoy, the Mighty Prometheus wasn’t out here. The Admiralty had said that they couldn’t risk the flagship of the Promethean SDF on a wild goose chase, escorting every convoy that left the home world, and now the results were plain to see.

  “Sir, Captain Steelbender is protesting your orders,” reported Comm., “he’s citing our operational orders, which are to escort every ship beyond the gravity limit.”

  “We can’t protect the Gem and the rest of the convoy at the same time. We’re barely holding them off right now,” Costel snapped, “you tell him that he can stay back and shepherd the Gem with his corvette if he’s so very concerned, but I’m taking the rest of the freighters with me. This convoy can’t be lost, do you understand me?” he demanded.

  “Relaying your reply now,” stammered the Comm. Officer.

  “We will fight and die if we have to, but the majority of this convoy is getting through,” Captain Costel Iorghu shouted.

  “Enemy Destroyer is closing on the Golden Goose, Sir,” reported Tactical after a momentary silence, “she’s taking fire.”

  “Punch it, Helm!” the Captain ordered fiercely.

  “Destroyer Number Two is coming around; she’s giving us her broadside!” declared Tactical.

  “Fire as he bears!” Costel shouted, ignoring the fact they were already pointed straight at the Destroyer, within laser range, and firing as fast as the ship’s weapons could manage.

  “Now, Chief Gunner,” Tactical Officer barked into his microphone, “don’t hold anything back!”

  A barrage of fire from several light and medium lasers punched out, hitting the Destroyer hard enough to cause some shield spotting. Then one, single, heavy laser mount lashed out, punching through the Destroyer’s shields.

  “A hit! Major engine damage to the destroyer’s main engine, Captain!” the Tactical Officer said and his entire section cheered. “The Chief Gunner was personally manning that heavy laser himself, Sir.”

  “Inform the Chief that a bottle of the best cognac from the Captain’s liquor cabinet will be sent over to his quarters the moment this battle is concluded, Lieutenant. Meanwhile, close us in for the kill, Helm,” the Captain ordered urgently. If they could finally pin down and eliminate at least one of these phantom ghost ships, they’d put some wind back in the sails of the rest of the SDF.

  The Prometheus Fire bored in on her prey, and several more shots hammered home on the relatively thin armor of the Destroyer’s outer hull. With other ship’s advantage in speed and maneuverability eliminated, the power gap between it and a Medium Cruiser—of whatever age, including the outdated Hammerhead class—became self-evident.

  “Don’t let her get away, Helm,” barked the Captain. The worm had finally turned and it was the Prometheus Fire that had done it.

  “Hyper footprint!” cried the Sensor Officer. “I’m reading multiple point transfers in the relative vicinity of our position.”

  “Blast it; I thought we launched three of these in order to spread them out to the point they couldn’t concentrate on any one of us. Have they abandoned the other convoys?” Costel Iorghu demanded.

  “Alpha convoy has turned back, and Beta Convoy reports two warships disabled, two more caught in a running battle with an enemy Destroyer, and the second Destroyer is now in the middle of the convoy and tearing up the merchant ships. The convoy leader has just ordered a scatter and return to base,” reported the Comm. Officer.

  “No,” Iorghu cursed as simultaneously with this news another two Destroyers, and a Light cruiser, jumped to just outside of heavy laser range.

  “Sir, we can’t take these kinds of numbers,” Tactical reported.

  “No! Not every single convoy,” he cried, running a hand through his hair and tugging on said hair desperately.

  “We can try again, Captain, but only if we’re alive to do so,” his XO said urgently.

  “Captain, we must turn around or everyone out here including us and the merchant ships will die for nothing,” said Tactical.

  Looking at the screen he saw that, other than the Brilliant Cargo Gem—which was already on its way back inside the hyper-limit—the rest of the merchant ships were nearly surrounded and about to be cut off from escape.

  “Sound the retreat,” Costel said ashes in his mouth as he uttered the fateful words, “inform Captain Steelbender and the merchant skippers they are to run back for the system; we’ll try to hold them off for as long as we can.”

  Unfortunately for the rest of the convoy, the raiders had little interest in tackling his heavily-armed Medium Cruiser, and promptly fell upon the relatively unarmed merchant freighters with a vengeance.

  Tears in his eyes, Costel stared as his sluggish warship burned for the running battle as fast as it could. But because of the Fire’s ancient engines, he was doomed to watch as the convoy fell apart and was cut to pieces. It appeared everything they’d said about him was right: he was a failure, not only as a Captain, but as an Officer in the Promethean SDF.

  ****************************************************

  “Two corvettes and a half a dozen merchant freighters, Commodore; it doesn’t get much better than this,” said the Destroyer Captain, lifting a cup of Gorgon Iced Ale in toast back aboard the flagship, which was now once again sitting out in the middle of nowhere, repairing its injuries and toasting its victories.

  “The acumen of
our adversaries continues to be sub-par,” Serge said deprecatingly, “against such enemies, victories such as this are to be expected.”

  “So long as they keep sending out that Medium Cruiser on escort duty, I’ll keep burning offerings at the altar,” joked the Captain. “With enemies like these, who needs friends—it’s not like we’d ever have to call for backup. I mean, really: a Hammerhead? Don’t they realize those are fleet formation warships, meant to hunt in packs and swarm larger ships or fend off smaller ones with their blunt-force power? That’s got to be one of the slowest warships for its size left in the galaxy—it’s hardly faster than a freighter! If this is the best fight that a Core World,” he sneered as he used the term, “of these provincials can offer, the Sector is as good as ours.”

  Commodore Serge smiled and stood. “A toast!” he declared.

  The rest of the officers in the room hastily stood.

  “To the Grand Reclamation!” he toasted.

  “The Reclamation!” cheered the assembled Officers.

  “And, as always, the first Galactic Empire!” shouted one of the Captains in the back.

  “The Empire!” thundered the every man in the room.

  “Long may she reign,” called out the shrill voice of the Ensign serving as Commodore Serge’s Flag Lieutenant.

  Chapter Fifty-five: Transferring the Locker

  “What are we doing in here again, Chief?” Brence puffed as he helped Spalding transfer another load onto the waiting grav-cart.

  As soon as the little cart was loaded, it zipped off toward the nearby shuttle all by itself.

  “We’ve got to transfer the Locker over to the new ship, my boy,” Spalding said, turning back to get another load of outdated point defense missiles.

  Behind the two men, another grav-cart smoothly pulled into the space just vacated by its compatriot.

  “But why us?” Brence asked, hurrying over and grabbing the other end of another rack of missile warheads. “Even though the Dreadnaught Class doesn’t support point defense missiles—and hasn’t, as far as I’m aware, for more than fifty years—I can still see why you’d want people moving them around. But for the rest of it…” Brence swung his arms to indicate a section they’d painstakingly cleared more than a half hour earlier, “We’ve got those new robots loading the shuttle; why couldn’t we use the robots to clear out those boxes of burnt-out data cores and sub-nodes? Surely we didn’t need to move them ourselves, sir.” Spalding stopped abruptly and turned to face Brence. “Bring in robots?” he scowled thunderously. “What do you mean bring in robots? Did I pick the wrong man to reveal the mysteries of the Locker to, Brence?”

  “N-no-no,” Brence said hastily, “I just don’t understand why we can’t even use a heavy load suit to move this stuff around. I know you don’t want to hear it, but most of this stuff is junk. I’m sure there are treasures in here, but nothing that’s too fragile to move without a suit…except maybe expired ordnance like those point defense missiles. Why are you keeping those, by the way? I mean, I assume you’re planning to keep them…”

  “Toss out perfectly good ordnance?” Spalding cried, sounding as if he’d been stabbed, “why, that series of missile is rated to be good for a hundred years before it becomes unstable; they’re barely sixty five! Chief Engineers and their initiated assistants, like yourself, have been stockpiling materials against a day of need for longer than this ship’s been in service. I’ll have you know that the Locker of the previous Clover—she of the same name, from before this ship was constructed—was transferred over here lock, stock, and two smokin’ barrels. This is history you’re looking at, Brence. Do you have any idea—any clue at all—just how many times this supply of ‘outdated parts’ and ‘expired ordnance’ has saved this ship—just since you’ve been aboard?!”

  “I know you had the ship’s old heavy and turbo lasers hidden in here after the Imperials had the Clover’s teeth pulled,” Brence said cautiously, “so I can see both the practical and historical significance.”

  “And bring in robots? Why, I’ve never heard of such thing,” Spalding scoffed.

  “It is standard operating procedure—it’s right in the manual,” Brence pointed out.

  “’The bleepin’ manual,’ he says! Why, I wrote portions of the ruddy manual—me and Chief Engineer Ansible, back before he was promoted into command of the Caprian Blue Repair Yard,” Spalding said scornfully.

  “We could at least use a few more hands, then,” Brence said desperately, “it won’t just take weeks—it’ll take months to clear out this pitch black cavern down here.”

  Spalding thrust a finger under his nose and waggled it from side to side. “The circle of trust on this one is very tight—and very fickly—Brence. There’ll be no outsiders in our business so long as I’m the Custodian of this here Locker,” he said firmly. “Besides, lad: trust in old Spalding. We’ll bring in the robots eventually, but only after we’ve cleared a path into the…” he looked around cautiously and deliberately lowered his voice, “into the heart of the ship.” He leaned back looking, both worried about being overheard and feeling very pleased with himself.

  “The Heart?” Brence asked, his eye brows climbing as he looked anxious and concerned.

  “Oh, aye, lad; even old Ansible never dared try what we’re about to do,” Spalding said with an unholy gleam in his eye, “and with good reason, for the Clover isn’t just the greatest ship in the galaxy because of ‘what’ she is—although she is, in my opinion, the greatest ship that was ever built—but also because of what is ‘inside’ her.”

  “That sounds…dangerous,” Brence turned white, “in this Heart?”

  “The secrets inside this ship, lad,” Spalding shook his head, “the mysteries. If only the walls could speak. If they could, worlds would burn; Systems could collapse, me boy-o! We are the entrusted guardians against that dreadful day. It’s our sacred trust to protect these secrets from the rest of the world—and to protect the rest of the galaxy from what is hidden inside!”

  “Uh…I’m not sure I’m the best person to be inside this circle,” Brence swallowed, “you do remember how I started out on this ship selling off my tools to purchase liquor?”

  “Ha!” Spalding clouted the other man hard enough to stagger him. “Since that no good, thievin’ Castwell’s been gone, you’ve straightened out into a mighty fine engineer—and even a not-half-bad officer. But Brence, me lad,” he leaned in, dragging the other engineer in closer, “there’s no backing out now. This is a two man job; can’t do it by myself. Besides, I’m sure you won’t disappoint me,” he threatened, giving a squeeze for emphasis.

  “How can you be sure?” Brence wheezed.

  “If we fail in our appointed task, to move this Locker, it could be fatal,” Spalding said seriously, “and that’s not a threat against you Brence, but a stone-cold fact for the both of us. There’s no backing out now, lad. You’ve seen too much; you’re in this for the duration, same as me.”

  “So…just the two of us,” Brence mumbled.

  “Exactly,” Spalding said happily.

  Apparently resigned to his fate, the other engineer reached down and picked up another box.

  “Bring in robots, ha!” Spalding chuckled. “What a joke. Why, we won’t be able to dare bring in those contraptions until after we finish clearing a path to the Heart of this ship. After we transfer the Heart, o ’course, then we can bring in a whole army of the things and get this Locker cleared out proper—right down to the diamond-plated flooring.”

  “What exactly is inside this Heart area that makes it so special,” Brence grunted, lifting up a large power converter and placing it on the next cart.

  “Let’s just say we have to move a couple of ‘oversized crystals’ and leave it at that,” Spalding said seriously. “As good as ye are, and as repentant as I take you to be now that you’ve reformed your slackin’ ways, I don’t think you’re ready for more than that yet. But I have faith that you will be…in time.”


  Brence smiled weakly.

  ****************************************************

  Two weeks later:

  “You’re not even going to use hover pallets?” Brence asked again in disbelief.

  “The hover function won’t survive the ion barrier we need for the transfer,” Spalding grunted, wiggling around underneath the old style pallet he was working on.

  “I didn’t know we even still had this sort of old rolling stock,” Brence muttered, poking one of the pallet’s wheels as he examined it before pausing. “Are you sure you don’t want to move these old regeneration tanks out of the way first?”

  “Like many things, people throw perfectly good tools away and then wonder where such things are when they need them. This old rolling pallet has been sittin’ in a corner of the Locker, gathering dust—and no, I don’t want to move the tanks. We don’t need them and we’ll fit past them plenty,” Spalding pontificated as he finished hooking in the last of the four fields on the second cart and then returned to his favorite topic. “Fortunately, we won’t have to build a brand new non-hover pallet out of metal stock ourselves, thanks to the foresight that’s gone into stocking this place with everything a man could need.” Why people—even those who should have known better—continued to throw away perfectly good material for lack of a little storage space never ceased to upset him.

  “Saves us the time, sir,” Brence shrugged. “Want me to test the fields? Not that I even know why we’re having a movable ion barrier covering every part of these rolling pallets. Neither do I care,” he added hastily.

  “Today’s the day,” Spalding declared, “a new floor for the Locker has been set aside and the isolation room is just now completed. We can transfer the rest of these supplies later by robot. Right now, we have our last job before us.”