Hold the Star: Samair in Argos: Book 2

by Michael Kotcher

  “Coming in range of the missile targets, Captain,” the Severite reported, her voice a trifle louder than was needed as she was unable to cover her excitement. This would be the first time she’d ever fired missiles outside of a simulation.

  “Lock on targets,” Tamara ordered, straightening in her command seat. There were four large rocks she wanted to test out the missiles on. Garidhak had scored well in the targeting exercises and Tamara was interested to see how she’d do in a live fire exercise.

  “Umm…” the cat said, working her console. “Okay, locked on, four targets, ma’am. Missiles ready.”

  Tamara noted the slight hesitation, but said nothing. “Fire at will,” she said.

  The Severite pressed the control and the forward launchers unleashed four missiles, which streaked away from the Cavalier toward their targets. They reached the targets and exploded, turning the huge rocks into expanding balls of plasma and shards of rock. Garidhak pumped a fist in the air. “Yes!”

  “Good shooting, Miss Garidhak,” Tamara said. “Damage report?” Her implants had pinged her about the shield strength.

  “Forward shields at seventy-four percent, ma’am,” Leicasitaj replied. “A bit of minor scoring on the hull, but nothing serious. I’ll make sure to have engineering teams take a look at it once we’re done with the exercises for the day.”

  “Very good, XO,” Tamara said, nodding. She tried very hard to hide a smile, knowing what was coming next.

  “Captain,” Ykzann, the male zheen seated at the sensor station called, sounding slightly concerned. “We have incoming contacts, Captain. Twelve of them. They’re approaching on an intercept course at high velocity.”

  Before Tamara could say anything, Leicasitaj turned and gave her a questioning look. Tamara managed to maintain a stern façade, but she wasn’t sure she’d fooled her XO. He turned around, one of his leg tentacles twitching a bit. “What kind of contacts, Sensors?” he called out. “Are there rocks on an intercept course?”

  “No, sir,” the zheen replied. “They’re definitely under power. They look more like fighters.”

  The Romigani stiffened in his chair. Then he started in alarm as a new window on his display lit up. Tamara was busy, her thumb pressed to the access port on her own station, altering settings on the ship’s weapon system, powering everything down to targeting level only, and engaging the firing safeties on the missiles and rail guns.

  “What the hell?” Garidhak breathed as her tactical controls suddenly altered. “Weapons are switching to targeting mode. Missiles are completely locked down.”

  Leicasitaj looked to his captain, who simply smiled at him and gestured for him to continue. He nodded, suddenly feeling fear’s icy grip. “Helm, bring us to course eleven by one-six-zero,” he ordered sharply. “Take us to max accel. Tactical, target the lead ships as they enter range. All forward guns.” Even though the rail guns were locked down, they would still show as firing in “training” and instead of pumping out metal slugs on their magnetic rails, a targeting laser would fire, but the computers on both the Cavalier and the target vessel would do the calculations to determine if a slug could reach and hit the target in the allotted time. The target would realize it was being shot at, with the same weapon’s signature on his sensors as a real rail gun projectile and possibly he could evade if his reflexes were fast enough.

  Twelve to one odds were very long, however, and Tamara had taken away the ship’s most potent weapons, the missile launchers. But, in a tactical situation, they might be beset by an unexpected enemy and the launchers might be down, or the magazines might be shot dry. The crew would need to learn to adapt. Tamara smiled to herself, leaning more comfortably in the chair, allowing Leicasitaj lead. She wanted to see how he’d handle this. If he could win, that would be fantastic, but Tamara was more interested to see how well he could keep himself and the crew under control and fighting. It would be something important for him to have if indeed he was going to be taking command of the ship.

  “Roll the ship,” he ordered, checking the sensor feeds for himself as the fighters closed on Cavalier’s position. He made a note to himself to speak with the Captain about possible starfighter defenses that the ship could employ for future engagements. “Tactical, open fire with rail guns, but I want you to lay down a spread between us and the incoming fighters. Then open fire on the edges of the field with the lasers.”

  It was an interesting tactical plan, Tamara admitted, but it was possible it might work. She smiled as the plan went into action. The “guns” opened up and the fighters broke formation.

  “Direct hit!” Garidhak crowed. “One fighter down.”

  “Eleven to go,” Leicasitaj said, though he couldn’t keep the smile from his face. “Change course, heading above the plane of the ecliptic, two-five-seven. Cease roll. Garidhak, target all your ventral guns straight ‘down’. They’re not in position yet, but when we change course, some of them will be.”

  “The main cluster is going to be above us in that position,” Garidhak pointed out. “The way they’re moving…”

  “I know,” Leicasitaj said. “But we’re not going to get them all in one salvo. We got to wear them down, hopefully take out enough of them to force a retreat.”

  “They’re trying to break us up,” Korqath, Commander of Aplora Squadron said over the tactical channel. “They’re going to swoop over us and attack us piecemeal.”

  “We got missiles, Lead,” Hukriss, his wingmate reminded him. “They’re only practice shots, but we should use them. One good punch will crack that thing in half.”

  “Excellent idea, Hukriss. Aploras, lock on the corvette,” Korqath ordered. He activated his targeting system, arming two of his missiles. Hukriss was right, the missiles were an obvious answer. “Let’s see how they respond to this.” The targeting reticule turned red and a solid tone indicated a lock. “Aploras, fire on target.” He depressed his triggers and a pair of missiles shot forth from the fighter’s launchers. They were joined by five other pairs of weapons as the other Aploras fired.

  “Incoming missiles,” Garidhak called, almost shrieking in near panic.

  “Calm down!” Leicasitaj snapped from his console, looking over to the cat. “Time to impact?”

  “Fourteen seconds.” The Severite was visibly trying to calm herself. “Missiles are tracking.”

  “Point defense,” the Romigani said, also trying to remain calm. Tamara said nothing, just watching the scene unfold around her. “All weapons, open fire.”

  The Cavalier open up, weapons flaring as all her guns went into continuous fire. “Two missiles down!” Garidhak crowed. “Four!” The ship’s heavy lasers continued to fire, the rail guns still firing off laser training shots. “Seven,” she said, blinking furiously, her ears lying flat against her skull. “Nine.” Her voice was getting lower, softer, more of a whisper. Panic was definitely setting in. “Five seconds.”

  “Helm, new course, down seven five degrees!” Leicasitaj snapped. The helm responded immediately; clearly Wymea was anticipating the order. The ship dove, the inertial compensators screaming to keep up but they couldn’t manage all of it. It suddenly felt as though they were sitting in a falling elevator as the ship accelerated.

  The missiles didn’t lose the lock, but they overshot, giving Garidhak the time she needed to shoot down the rest. Of course, the ship’s weapons facing away from the missiles hadn’t been silent during this time. They cut through the Delphon fighters, tagging four of the needle-nosed ships, the other two managing to barely get clear.

  The Aploras moved in, strafing the corvette, managing to avoid the ship’s counter fire. The Cavalier rolled and climbed, managing to shoot down two of the Aploras before another salvo of missiles roared in and took her out.

  “Simulation complete,” Tamara said, her comms activated to reach the fighters outside. “Very well done all of you. Aploras, Delphon, return to the station for refuel and debrief.” She ended the call. Looking around the bridge, she n
odded. “As I said, well done.”

  “But we lost,” Garidhak said dejectedly.

  Tamara shook her head. “This time. But that wasn’t the point of the exercise,” she said. “I wanted to see how you’d react under pressure. Without an experienced hand in command, and without your missile launchers in play. And in the process you managed to evade their missiles and shoot down seven of them before they managed to get you. I’m well pleased with your performance.” Smiles and other displays of pleasure broke out on the bridge.

  “There will be a hot wash of the exercise in an hour. In the meantime, take us back to the mining station,” Tamara ordered. “We need to refuel and rearm and I want engineering to go over the shield generators, make sure we didn’t take any serious damage from flying through the belt. Mister Leicasitaj, you have the bridge.” She stood and walked out, heading for her quarters.

  The starfighters landed in the bay without any fanfare, only permission from the landing signals officer. But once the cockpits opened, the pilots poured out, all of them chittering and laughing and using their hands to display the maneuvers they’d pulled during the exercise.

  Finally, Korqath called a halt to the festivities. “All right!” he bellowed, an impressive feat considering his race. Most zheen were not known for auditory projection, but the pilot managed it with what seemed like ease. “Get yourselves cleaned up and fed. We’ve got hot wash from the training exercise in one hour! Good work everyone. We took more casualties than I’d have liked, but we took down the objective. Move it out, people. One hour!” he repeated. There was a chorus of acknowledgements, some antennae waggling by the zheen, and within minutes the pilots had cleared out of the hangar while the maintenance crew moved in to take charge of the ships.

  Korqath nodded to himself as he headed for the squad room to secure his skinsuit and life support gear. “What’s the story with the new ship, Boss?” Hukriss asked, hustling to keep up.

  “What are you talking about?” he asked. “It’s a company defensive asset. I don’t understand the problem.”

  “What I’m wondering is why we have it,” his wingmate replied. “I mean, we have a dozen fighters right now. Why not fill out the squadrons, get us up to full strength and then get the bigger ships out?”

  Korqath clacked his mandibles. “I don’t know,” he said honestly. “Maybe the commander is trying to diversify forces. I mean if what she’s said about those pirate forces out there is true, having starfighters alone wouldn’t be enough to defend against those cruisers.”

  “Neither would a corvette,” Hukriss pointed out.

  “No, but maybe we’d stand a better chance,” Korqath replied. “I don’t know. I think she might have built it with the intention of building more to sell to the government.”

  Hukriss’s antennae straightened. “That makes more sense. I imagine there’s a lot of money to be made by building ships for a planetary government.” He hissed slightly. “So that sucks. We get a crappy defense because everyone wants to make more money? And in the end we get nothing because the pirates roll over us?”

  Korqath shrugged. “Not my department.” His antennae waggled a bit. “But I think I am going to speak with her about retasking some of the constructors to getting us more ships. But, after the debrief.”

  “No, I think that is a good idea,” Tamara said, leaning back slightly in her chair and crossing her legs. “I’ve been putting it off.”

  “Why, Commander?” Korqath asked. “I mean, why isn’t it a priority to get the fighter squadrons up to full strength? Isn’t having forty ships better than having only twelve?”

  She sighed. “Yes, of course. The problem is that I only have three fighter designs to work off of.”

  “What?” he asked, flabbergasted. “But you’re the Chief of all this out here,” he gestured. He was seated in his own cabin aboard the station, while she sat in hers aboard the Cavalier, as they held the conference via communications software. “All the stuff you’ve built, tugs and shuttles and mining bots, hell, the station! You can’t make starfighters?”

  Tamara shook her head. “Do you have any idea how incredibly complex a good fighter’s systems are to design? I can’t just slap an engine on a box with a control stick and a gun and call it a starfighter. It takes a lot of work to design something that will be effective in combat. And I just don’t have the time for that. I’ve been borrowing some processor cycles from Stella on the Grania Estelle to try and work out something useful, but Stella doesn’t have much in the way of experience in designing ships that we could use for that. So, it’s down to me. Until I can find someone here in system that could do it.”

  “One person?”

  Tamara laughed. “No, although if there is a singular person who could design a decent starfighter, I’d hire them in a minute. No, I expect it would need to be a group of engineers or a design firm doing the work.” She waved a hand in dismissal. “But that’s something to deal with later. In the meantime, I can get the Samarkand building some more fighters for the Aplora squadron.”

  “What?”

  “More of the Sepulcre class fighters,” Tamara replied. She shrugged. “They’re certainly not the most advanced fighters, and they’re a bit light on maneuverability, but they’re the best we can do for now.”

  Korqath’s antennae flicked. “Looks like I’ll be able to round out the Aploras. More zheen pilots!” he said excitedly. “I can think of several that will jump at the chance to join the squadron.” He rubbed his hands together in excitement. “This will be great.”

  “I’ll speak with Ms. Sterling as soon as I finish here with you,” Tamara promised. “She won’t be happy with me about screwing with her build schedules like this, but she’ll understand.” She looked at her squadron commander. “All right, Korqath, you get some new recruits, I’ll see about getting you some new ships.”

  “Thank you, Commander.” He clicked as he spoke, his excitement was so palpable. “I’ll get right on that.”

  “Contact me when you have enough pilots to fill out a squadron of twenty,” she told him. “I’m putting it on you to train them once you have the ships.”

  “Me?” he asked, slightly overwhelmed.

  “You,” she said. “You’ll have access to the simulator complex on the station, and I expect you to take full advantage of it. But I also expect to see live exercises in your ships. I’ll be around to assist, but if you intend to be the commander of Aplora squadron, training is part of your responsibilities.”

  He nodded slowly. “I understand. I won’t fail.” Then Korqath clacked his mandibles. “What about the Delphon?”

  She pursed her lips. “Well, I needed more fighters to fill out our ranks, but those ships they’re using really are inferior. They’re good for traffic control and merchant freighter interdiction, but they’d get chewed up in a real fight. I’ll either need to find new ships or find that design team we were talking about and come up with something new.” She shook her head slightly. “You get on that recruitment. I’ll get the ships for your squadron. Contact me when you have them all together.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” And Tamara cut the connection. Korqath nodded to himself. He had some calls to make and trip back to the planet to plan. It was too long a trip to try and fly in the fighters all the way back to the planet, but perhaps the Commander would be willing to take the Samarkand back for a recruiting mission. Those who just hadn’t made the cut on the original recruitment should do to fill out the ranks… He’d need to contact the Samarkand and get the Commander’s notes…

  Korqath immediately started making plans, jotting notes on a datapad.

  “Ma’am, you need to make up your mind,” Eretria said sourly. “I know that protecting the system is important and all that…” her tone indicated she thought it was pretty low on the importance scale, “But if you’re serious about getting the fueling station done, we can’t keep stopping and retasking the constructor units.”

  “I know it’s a hassle, Ere
tria,” Tamara said. “But it really is important that we get these defenses in place. And we won’t be diverting the replicators and constructor bots away from the work on the station for too long. I need you to have Kay’grax and his team work on the fighters. It’ll make the schedule slip a bit, I know, but I’ll have them back as soon as possible.”

  The other woman sighed, shaking her head slightly. “And you’re going to do this to me again once you get this squadron of yours up and running. You’d mentioned wanting to get a second squadron of fighters up to defend the asteroid mining operation and the gas mine. Which means that you’re going to co-opt my constructors again, aren’t you?”

  Now it was Tamara’s turn to sigh. “I know it’s not ideal, Eretria, but it really is something we need. The threat out there is real.”

  “Is it, ma’am?” the engineer asked. “You’ve talked about this threat many times, but so far, there’s been nothing. The most we’ve seen are warships from Ulla-tran, but all they’ve done is act as escorts to their own freighters. We’ve seen nothing even remotely threatening here in decades.”

  Tamara pursed her lips. “Have you ever been out of the system, Eretria?”

  She sighed, crossing her arms over her chest. “Ma’am, we’ve had this discussion. And no, I haven’t been out of the system before.”

  “There are some things you need to see,” Tamara said. “I’ll have some of the sensor logs from the Grania Estelle sent over today. I want you to watch them. What happened on the bulk freighter only happened a few months ago and only one system away from here. You need to know.”

  Eretria nodded. “Very good, ma’am.” She sighed again. “I’ll be waiting for the upload.” It was clear from her tone that she didn’t believe there was anything on those logs that she needed to see. Eretria nodded and signed off the connection.

  Tamara just shook her head. She turned to her terminal and began pressing commands. She sent a request to the Grania Estelle for copies of the sensor logs. She wasn’t worried that Stella or the Captain would hold them back; they were important pieces of information. At least they’d better not, if they knew what was good for them, she vowed.