“How many Kroll are there?” Dean asked.
“No one knows,” Querf said. “They are vast, yet unorganized in a traditional sense. They spread information from tribe to tribe. The only time they communicate more openly is when they are grouped together or when there is danger.”
“They can communicate across distances?”
“Yes, if the other ships are not encased in their electro-energy fields.”
“So, if one ship is attacked it can send out a distress signal, but if no other ships in the area are open, they won’t hear it?”
“It is not the wave form of communication your species is so fond of. It is more of a mental connection that is not hindered by physical laws.”
“You mean they can communicate instantly across great distances?”
“It is not communication of a form humans employ. I could show you if you were here with me. It is more of a shared empathy.”
“So when they sense danger, others of their kind can sense danger too?”
“That is more correct than labeling their connection a form of true communication,” Querf said. “It is difficult to describe something that one has only seen but not truly experienced to another who has no concept of the thing being described.”
“I get that,” Dean said. “Can their ships go faster than we’re aware of?”
Querf shook his bulbous head. “You have piloted their vessels to their maximum capacity.”
“So even if they communicate danger across the galaxy, the others couldn’t rush to their aid any faster than we can travel. That’s good to know.”
“You are going to fight the Kroll, yes?”
Dean just smiled but didn’t answer. Querf was not a fool, but Dean didn’t want to simply give away their intentions. When the fighting happened, it would be fast and ferocious. Hopefully, there would be no warning for the Kroll, no unexpected surprises for the task force, but Dean believed in preparing for the worst.
Chapter 36
“Major Blaze, can you join me on the bridge?” Admiral Matsumoto asked.
It was more than a simple inquiry; Dean had rarely been to the bridge since the mission began, and Matsumoto rarely made any requests of Dean’s time. He moved quickly from the communications center, across the wide, curving passageway, and into one of the dozen or so chutes that led to the aviary. Dean had grown accustomed to the strange ship, and his only criticism was the lack of human furniture. The crew had been busy remaking the ring section of the ship, repurposing the holding cells into recreation centers, exercise studios, and even a movie theater. Seats were at a premium, and anything soft was converted into pillows or cushions and used to make sitting on the floor more comfortable. The aviary had also become a popular place on the alien ship. The chamber was so large that entire groups could mingle and lounge in the park-like atmosphere without disturbing the crew working on the makeshift bridge near the nest structure.
Dean passed several couples strolling across the spongy turf of the aviary. One couple was even stretched out on blankets. Dean was fascinated to think that people on an extremely dangerous mission could put the risk and danger out of their minds long enough to relax and enjoy intimate moments with the people they cared about. The information the crew had learned from Querf had led to an almost euphoric attitude on the ship. The future seemed bright and exciting, and there was an attitude of invincibility that made Dean nervous. He knew their enemy, and the Kroll wouldn’t simply lie down and die or run away in fear. They were predators, and they would fight desperately to kill every last human on the stolen ships if given a chance. Dean’s task was to make sure the aliens didn’t have that chance, but he feared what would happen if the Kroll managed to get aboard the ship.
Before he reached the bridge, he was met by Captain Rey Ortega. She was a serious commander, and Dean got the impression that she didn’t approve of the way he’d dealt with Captain Grant, but she was too good of an officer to actually voice her opinions to her superior officer. She kept her platoon busy in the aviary and didn’t often venture into the ring portion of the huge harvester ship.
“Captain Ortega,” Dean said. “How are things with the Viper platoon?”
“All is well, Major. Admiral Matsumoto asked me to escort you up to the command platform.”
“Lead the way,” Dean replied.
He knew his way to the bridge and didn’t need an escort, but he didn’t mind one either. Admiral Matsumoto was a formal commander, a fact that made assigning Captain Ortega to the aviary a good match. They understood one another, which Dean felt was important for a Recon platoon’s success. The admiral had made substantial changes to the bridge, which consisted of a grouping of consoles on the ground near a large metal staircase that led up to the top of the nest structure. The lip of the nest was several feet wide, and to Dean’s surprise, a row of vid screens had been erected along the outer edge of the walkway. From his position at the top of the nest area—which he was referring to as the ‘command platform’—Matsumoto could monitor the ship’s system, direct orders to his officers below, and stay in contact with the operators manually piloting the ship.
Dean followed Captain Ortega up the stairs and onto the command platform, where he waited to be addressed by the admiral, who was standing close to one of the large vid screens studying something. Dean felt a premonition that all was not well. They had been on course for nearly two weeks, the Kroll ships hurtling through space faster than the speed of light, and other than the escape attempt by the Pergantee and Dean’s personal issues with Captain Grant, they hadn’t encountered any problems. In Dean’s mind, things were too quiet, and Admiral Matsumoto summoning him to the Bushido’s Bridge was not a good sign.
“Major,” Matsumoto said, looking up and then waving Dean over to him. “We are slowing down.”
“For the task force exercises?” Dean asked. “I didn’t think we were doing that for a few more days.”
The plan to stop and send the Hannibal back to Earth had been agreed upon by everyone, but once the information from Querf began to excite the crew, they grew reluctant to part ways with the little alien. Looking at Querf still gave Dean a feeling of dread; the large, soulless eyes, the alien gray skin, and the abnormally large head all seemed strange, even dangerous to Dean—yet he, like the rest of the crew, had come to enjoy spending time with the Pergantee. The task force exercises had been pushed back more than once for various reasons, but Dean knew the reality was that no one wanted to see Querf leave the ship.
“We are not stopping for exercises. In fact, we are not stopping the ship.”
“Is there a problem with the gravity drive or the power plant?”
“No,” Matsumoto admitted. “Something else is happening. Something outside of the ship is slowing us down.”
“You’re sure?” Dean asked, an icy sensation creeping down his back and making the hair on his neck stand on end.
“Positive.”
“And the other ships?”
“They are slowing down as well. I have ordered the Moses and the Dodge City to spread out on either side of us. I feel we are being halted the same way Admiral Masterson was in the Apache when they tried to enter Kroll space.”
“Is that possible? These vessels don’t build gravity chains. How can the Kroll know we’re coming?”
“It is possible that they have interdictor technology.” Matsumoto said.
“What is that?” Dean asked.
“The projection of a field that would slow matter, perhaps even halt it. The theory has been around for decades, but no real work has ever been done on it, to my knowledge. The Kroll may have such technology. It would be ideal for capturing approaching vessels to add to their own ships.”
“Makes sense,” Dean said. “We should ask Querf about it.”
“I have already sent a query to our engineers, but those answers can wait.”
“How much time do we have?”
“Less than half an hour.”
; “That’s not much time,” Dean said. “Are the nukes in the tug vessels ready?”
“They are, and the operators are prepared, but we have no idea what we will encounter.”
“Alright, send all hands to battle stations,” Dean said. “I want every crewman in evac suits, and let’s get Querf sedated.”
“I will send those orders now,” the admiral said. “If you like, you can observe the situation from here on the command platform with me. Either our plans will work or they won’t, in which case you will need to command the defense of our vessels while I work to get us out of the area.”
“Is it possible that the interdictor field can hold us in place?” Dean asked. “Nothing kept the Apache from fleeing when we broke her free from the Kroll ship.”
“We will not know until we try,” Matsumoto said. “Let us hope we do not have to try.”
“Captain,” Dean said, turning to Ortega. “I want Viper platoon on full alert.”
“Yes, sir,” Ortega said.
Dean switched on his command channel. “Raptor platoon, we are on full alert. Take station at beta point on the ring and stand by for further orders.”
“Roger that,” Captain Grant said stoically.
“Captain Parker, will you please assemble the Wolfpack at alpha point? I’ll be keeping an eye on things from the bridge for now.”
“Yes sir, Major,” Parker said.
She had been doing more and more with Dean’s platoon. Not taking command, but overseeing the minor details and duty logs so that Dean could focus on the entire task force. They had assigned names to the sections of the ring. No one wanted their platoon spread around the entire structure, so alpha point was just outside the tunnel to the Hannibal and beta point was on the opposite side of the ship. If they were boarded, the two platoons could converge without having to move as far as they might if trouble broke out and all the specialists were grouped in one place.
“Let’s do a communications check,” Dean ordered. “This is Major Dean on the bridge of the Bushido, over.”
“This is the Dodge City,” Admiral Masterson responded. “We read you loud and clear, over.”
“This is the Moses,” Admiral Aviv said. “We read you five by five, over.”
“Operators are standing by, over,” Esma said, which made Dean feel a little better.
There was no telling what they would find when their ships came to a stop. Their radar and telemetry wouldn’t allow them to see what might be waiting for them until they were a few million miles out, which didn’t leave them much time to prepare. If the Pergantee managed to warn the Kroll—or perhaps even the former occupants of the very ship he was in had managed to send a warning across the cosmos—the mission might end abruptly. Dean wanted the chance for Esma to hear his voice, and possibly to hear hers if they were going to be met by overwhelming force.
“I’ve got bogeys on radar,” an officer from down below the command deck shouted. “Contacts on station at two, seven, niner. Designate Zulu One and Zulu Two.
“On screen,” Matsumoto instructed.
Dean looked over his shoulder at the radar display and saw two small dots. He felt an immediate sense of relief, but knew that even a single Kroll ship could spell disaster for the mission.
“Looks like two Kroll longships,” the officer below them called out. “Neither one is moving.”
“Thank you,” Matsumoto said calmly.
“It’s time to test the tug vessels,” Dean said over the command channel of his comlink. “We’ll drop the containment field on the Dodge City and the Moses. I want each ship sending one tug vessel armed and ready to deploy on my orders, over.”
Everyone who was involved radioed in their confirmation of Dean’s orders. He would have preferred to send the tug vessels from the harvester ship, but the risk of being seen as an enemy vessel and attacked was greater with the containment field down. Dean had the larger crew, the most nuclear warheads, and the invaluable Pergantee captives. He couldn’t risk all of that just to have a little more control.
“We are at cruising speed and slowing,” Matsumoto said.
Dean cleared his throat and took a deep breath in an effort to slow down his heart, which was galloping like a frightened horse in his chest. If their plan didn’t work, they would know for certain soon. In Dean’s mind, the plan was sound, yet he couldn’t help but worry that they might fail. If that happened, he didn’t know what he would do; there was nothing for him to go home to. This would be his last mission unless he was very much mistaken, and he wanted it to be a resounding success. Both for his own peace of mind and for the future of the human race.
Dean took another deep breath as he watched the numbers counting down the miles between the ship he was on and the enemy Kroll vessels.
“Moses, Dodge City, you are cleared to engage!”
Chapter 37
“Seed ships are away,” an unknown voice on the command channel of the task force comlink said.
“I have two tug vessels on radar,” the officer down below Dean said. “Designating Alpha One and Alpha Two.”
Watching on the radar, Dean couldn’t help but hold his breath. The teardrop-shaped vessels crossed the distance between the ships in a matter of a few seconds, almost as if they were actual missiles being fired at the enemy in atmo.
“Are we far enough away to avoid damage?” Dean asked Matsumoto.
“Yes…according to studies on nuclear detonations in hard vacuum,” the admiral said, turning toward Dean with a frown creasing his face, “that are over a century old.”
Dean wanted to curse, but he didn’t want to take a chance that someone might hear him. He was the mission commander, and if he didn’t have faith in their abilities, it would cast doubt across the entire task force.
“Alpha One has made contact with Zulu One,” the officer below informed them.
“Long-range cameras at maximum zoom,” Matsumoto said. “I want to see the Kroll ships.”
Dean watched as one of the many vid screens changed from a readout of systems on the alien ship to a high-resolution image of the shadowy Kroll vessels. They were hard to see without the light of a local star; their hulls had no running lights, and the ships were little more than dark blobs against a distant star field.
“Second seed ship has made contact with Zulu Two.”
“Trigger ordinance!” Dean commanded.
“Roger,” said one operations officer.
“Affirmative,” said the other.
They were on different vessels, miles apart, operating alien tug ships that were nearly 100 miles distant by the time the nuclear order was given. Dean watched the screen, scarcely daring to breathe. Suddenly a white light shot through the ship on Dean’s right, filling the area with a glare that was hard to watch even on the vid screen. Then, hardly a second later, the huge Kroll ship was violently consumed by the nuclear blast. Dean had expected the ship to break apart, but instead it blossomed into white fire, feeding a tiny star that burned bright for a second and then disappeared, snuffed out by cold space.
The second Kroll vessel was turning away from its sister ship when it was hit by the shock wave and spun around like an empty soda can kicked down the gutter by a zealous toddler. A split second later the second ship, already tumbling through space, disappeared in its own ball of flame.
“Bogeys neutralized,” the officer below the command deck said.
“Can we move freely?” Matsumoto asked the operators piloting the Bushido.
“Yes, Admiral. We have acceleration.”
“Take us over the impact site,” he said, relaying orders that Dean only half-heard.
His head was spinning with the success of their plan. The nuclear weapons were effective. The remote piloting controls were effective. They were going to be successful when they reached the Urglatta home world, he just knew it. They were going to make the Kroll wish they had never heard of the human race.
“Captain Dante,” Dean said. “Continue your ex
ercise.”
“Roger that, Command,” she said. “Prepare to drop the containment field.”
“Admirals, I don’t want us dropping our guard,” Dean said over the command channel. “When the Apache was confronted in this manner, more ships arrived in short order. I want our eyes and ears watching for any sign of approaching vessels, over.”
The admirals all acknowledged Dean’s order. He guessed his reminder was unnecessary, but their victory over the Kroll ships was entirely too easy. If Querf was right, the second ship had just enough time to send a distress call before it was obliterated by the nuclear warhead.
“Debris field,” said one of the officers below Dean.
“What’s left?” Dean asked Admiral Matsumoto.
“Some irradiated chunks of metal, although none look to be larger than a dinner plate.”
“So they can’t harm us?”
“No,” Matsumoto said. “The test was successful.”
“Perhaps better than we thought,” Dean agreed. “It can’t be that easy.”
The look Admiral Matsumoto gave Dean signaled his agreement, but he didn’t say anything aloud. They both looked back at the plot. There were sixteen new ships on the vid screen, but fortunately they were all designated in blue, which Dean knew meant friendly ships. They were the tug ships launched from the Bushido, which had been termed ‘seed ships’ since they each carried a hidden nuclear warhead that would be planted inside the Kroll ships they fought. They were moving in a single-file line following Esma’s ship, which she was putting through its paces, ensuring that the remote piloting controls were effective.
Two hours later, the seed ships were all back in their places on the Kroll ship’s hull, and the area had been thoroughly searched. Dean was about to give the order to detonate the charges around the Hannibal’s hull that would break her free from the goo holding her in place. Querf had been moved to the escort ship, and the crew of the Hannibal was preparing to make the voyage back to the Sol system.
Abyss Of Savagery Page 25