The Lost Command (Lost Starship Series Book 2)

by Heppner, Vaughn

  On the bridge of Victory, Maddox sat in the command chair. Valerie had communications and scanning, while Keith piloted the ancient starship.

  “Professor?” the captain asked.

  “It’s set up,” Ludendorff said on the screen. “But I have no idea how long the cannon will fire and how we’ll dissipate the excess energy.”

  “Lieutenant?” Maddox asked.

  Valerie made some quick adjustments on her board. “I have one of their star cruisers targeted, sir.”

  “Let’s wait a few minutes longer,” Maddox said.

  Valerie didn’t nod. She watched her board with total concentration.

  Several minutes later, the massed enemy beams merged into one giant ray. It smashed out of the void and struck a battleship’s new wave harmonics. The hellish energy turned the shield a bright cherry red. The affected area grew in a concave shape, showing the spheroid nature of the shield. Almost immediately, the spot nearest the hitting beam became brown, darkening every second toward black. If a big enough area became black, the shield would collapse. Once that happened, the hull armor would have to absorb twenty-four beams striking as one. It was a pitiless strategy on the enemy’s part.

  Victory reached the Fifth Fleet’s forward sheet of vessels. It slid among the battleships, cruisers and empty motherships.

  “Fire,” Maddox said in a low voice.

  The giant antimatter engines inside Victory began to howl as they built up power.

  “What’s happening, Professor,” Maddox shouted.

  “The disruptor beam takes fantastic levels of energy,” Ludendorff said on the split-screen. “I can’t talk. I have to monitor the board, judging this to a nicety.”

  The howl rose even higher.

  Keith clapped his hand over his ears. Valerie hunched her head. Maddox sat straight, refusing to acknowledge the danger or the noise.

  Ludendorff spoke on the split-screen. Maddox couldn’t hear his words above the howl.

  The captain understood though. He jumped up and strode to Valerie, squeezing her shoulder. She jerked in surprise, staring up at him. He nodded sharply. She whipped back toward her board and pressed the firing button.

  The howl weakened to a whine. A new sound started, growling like a hungry slarn. The growling intensified: building, building and then a release noise told Maddox the cannon fired its deadly disruptor ray.

  With his right hand on Valerie’s shoulder, Maddox bent over and watched her screen.

  The disruptor ray did not beam like a laser in a continuous line. Instead, it ejected as a blob of force.

  Was this even a beam at all? Maddox decided not to worry about it. He straightened, turning to the main screen. “Build up for another shot,” he said.

  “I don’t recommend it,” Ludendorff said.

  “Do it,” Maddox said. “We may need a second shot to kill the star cruiser.”

  “Right,” Ludendorff said. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

  At that moment, Valerie stiffened. Maddox turned in time to see the effect of the disruptor ray.

  The blob of force struck a star cruiser’s shield. The entire electromagnetic screen went black with overload, and then it went down.

  Valerie blinked with amazement. “Do you see that, sir?” she whispered.

  “I do. Ludendorff!” Maddox shouted.

  The antimatter howl began anew.

  “Track that star cruiser,” Maddox said. “We have to kill it before it can retreat behind a different vessel.”

  At that moment, the enemy’s intense, combined beam knocked down Battleship Blucher’s shield. The massive ray now heated the hull armor, burning through the thick, toughened metal. It would be a matter of a minute or less before the beam destroyed the Bismarck-class battleship.

  “Now,” Ludendorff said. “The cannon is ready. You must fire at once, as I can’t bleed away excess energy.”

  “Target the same star cruiser!” Maddox shouted.

  Valerie did so, and the disruptor cannon fired again. It was a race of seconds as the ray moved at the speed of light, heading for the star cruiser trying to do a mouse down its hole—trying to hide behind another of its kind.

  The enemy lost the race. The second disruptor shot stuck the star cruiser’s hull armor, blasting through and starting a chain-reaction within the vessel. The enemy ship finally managed to sneak behind another star cruiser. Then, it must have exploded. A white flare of brilliance told of the vessel’s end. The star cruiser’s inner core must have blown.

  “Look, sir!” Valerie shouted. “A dozen star cruiser shields are turning red. Now, they’re brown.”

  “I suggest we let the cannon cool,” Ludendorff shouted on the screen.

  “Are you mad?” Maddox asked. “We have a weapon the New Men can’t believe we own. Pound them hard. Don’t give them time to think.”

  “The risk rises, Captain,” the professor said.

  “I understand,” Maddox said. “Two more shots, Ludendorff. I want them.”

  As the enemy cone formation kept beaming, the giant ray burned through Battleship Blucher’s armor. The beam turned interior decks into slag and struck the engine core. A titanic explosion told of the battleship’s end. Mass—decking, engines, food, munitions, people and water—and billowing heat expanded, hurling the debris and energy outward in a giant sphere. The nearest Star Watch vessels took the brunt of the blast. Their shields went critical, but held just barely.

  Victory was far enough away that none of the destroying blast reached the starship. The disruptor cannon fired its third and fourth rays in close succession.

  The result proved just as fantastic as the first time. Another star cruiser blew up, turning more nearby enemy shields red and then brown. One of the previously stricken vessels lost its shielding.

  That was too much for the cone formation. Each destroyed star cruiser did too much damage to its side-by-side neighbors. The cone broke apart. The New Men vessels drifted farther away from each other. That broke up the giant beam. Now, the enemy star cruisers fired their individual rays, striking various battleships and heavy cruiser shields.

  “Captain,” Ludendorff said. “My make-shift dissipater is going to blow. We have to wait to fire again.”

  “Yes,” Maddox said, “wait. We’ve busted up the enemy cone. Second Lieutenant Maker, pull us back from the front sheet.”

  “Aye-aye, sir,” Keith said.

  “Sir,” Valerie said, “the admiral is on the line.”

  Maddox faced the big screen. Fletcher grinned like a maniac.

  “You royal son of bitch!” Fletcher shouted. “You broke the cone formation. Congratulations, Captain Maddox. You’ve given me a fighting chance. I’ll never forget this. I owe you a debt I can’t repay. Anytime, anywhere, ask me for anything. If I can give it to you, I’ll do it.”

  “I’m asking right now, sir,” Maddox said.

  “Yes?”

  “Destroy the New Men for me.”

  Fletcher’s grin broke into a savage smile. “This is a death ride, son. You know that, right?”

  “No, sir, I don’t know anything of the kind. When I play, I play to win, not to draw and never to take second place.”

  “Right,” Fletcher said. “Win.” The smile vanished, leaving fierce determination on the admiral’s face. “I hope you have some more shots left in that miracle weapon of yours, Captain.”

  “Yes, sir,” Maddox said. “So do I.”

  -43-

  The fleets converged on each other, the distance rapidly dwindling between them.

  The big Earth missiles Maddox had unloaded earlier tried to reach the star cruisers. The enemy shot the Titans down, but that took time, targeting and beams. It meant those star cruisers didn’t fire for those minutes at Fifth Fleet vessels.

  Battleship Blucher was gone. The enemy star cruisers now collapsed Battleship Chattanooga’s shield. Enemy beams burned deeper into the hull armor. Escape pods should have fled the stricken ship.

  F
rom Valerie’s board, Maddox heard the admiral ordering the battleship’s crew to flee. Chattanooga’s commodore respectfully informed Fletcher to stuff the order. The battleship’s personnel yearned to fire their lasers at the enemy. Soon, the vessel would be in range. They were dead anyway. It was time to enter the next life with glory in their hearts.

  Thirty seconds later, Chattanooga’s crew no longer had a choice. The vessel broke apart under multiple star cruiser beams. Fortunately, there was no fusion core reaction. The chief engineer had braved critical radiation poisoning to go inside to pull the rods. He made sure such a chain-reaction had been impossible.

  There were lesser explosions throughout the hit vessel, though. Battleship Chattanooga broke into five uneven pieces. The biggest chunk tumbled end-over-end. Two destroyers moved up at the admiral’s orders. With their lesser guns, the destroyers shattered the tumbling piece into smaller chunks, making sure it didn’t smash against a front-line vessel’s shield and weaken it.

  The third lost battleship didn’t even break apart. It went gray, hurdling through space with Star Watch corpses in its belly.

  By that time, the fleets entered heavy-mount laser range. The remaining battleships began firing back. Thick rays of deadly light speared from the huge Star Watch vessels. They hit enemy star cruisers, chewing against the shields.

  It would still be some time before the smaller SW heavy cruisers could strike the approaching enemy with their shorter-range beams.

  “Captain,” Ludendorff said over the screen. “I believe I can give you three more shots. That will be it then.”

  “Three shots will only kill one more star cruiser,” Maddox said. “It takes two hits to destroy one of them. I need a fourth shot.”

  “Sir,” Valerie said. “Maybe you can use the disruptor to just knock down an enemy shield. Let Fletcher know which star cruiser you’re going to strike. He can coordinate the battleships to shoot all their lasers at it. With the shield gone, the heavy lasers might be able to chew through the armor before the star cruiser can hide behind a different vessel.”

  Maddox’s eyes gleamed. “That’s an excellent idea, Lieutenant. Get me the admiral.”

  In seconds, Maddox explained the idea to Fletcher.

  “Which star cruiser do we hit first?” the admiral asked.

  “Pick it,” Maddox told Valerie. “Then tell the admiral your decision.”

  Lieutenant Noonan did exactly that.

  In another minute, Victory’s antimatter engines howled with build-up. Captain Maddox slid forward on his chair as he watched the main screen. His gut churned with anticipation. Would this work? Could they kill more star cruisers? The enemy was whittling away Fifth Fleet’s best battleships one at a time.

  “Now,” Valerie whispered. She stabbed the firing pad.

  Victory’s disruptor cannon shot its blob of highly charged energy. The glob sped through the void and knocked down yet another enemy shield. Seconds before the shot, a spread of mighty Star Watch lasers beamed against it. As the shield blackened, overloaded and vanished, the heavy-mount lasers pounded against the hull armor. The star cruiser moved sharply, trying to get behind its nearest unwounded companion. The Star Watch lasers burned deeper, deeper into the armor. The enemy vessel increased speed—

  A vaporization of matter and billowing energy told of the star cruiser’s brilliant ending. One second, it was there. The next, debris showed that nothing, not even New Men-built warships, lasted forever.

  Two more times, Victory used the disruptor ray, knocking down enemy shields. Two more times, the combined wattage of heavy-mount laser power destroyed their foe.

  The New Men had annihilated three battleships. The Fifth Fleet with Victory had taken out five star cruisers. Amazingly, the advantage belonged to the regular humans fighting under the Star Watch banner.

  “Captain,” Ludendorff said. “That’s it. We dare not risk another shot.”

  Maddox stared at the screen showing the enemy formation. Nineteen star cruisers yet faced thirty-three capital ships. How many star cruisers could the New Men lose before their resolve broke? How many reserve vessels did the enemy side have anyway? Winning this fight meant getting these Star Watch vessels back home to the repair yards. The Fifth Fleet had to reach the Tannish Laumer-Point.

  In that moment, Maddox knew their lack of intelligence on the enemy keenly hurt Star Watch. How could one make informed decisions if one didn’t have all the information? Maybe the invasion armada was the full extent of the New Men’s manufacturing ability. They had these ships—and the others that hadn’t made it for the fight—and that would be it.

  It didn’t make sense the New Men had huge fleets of star cruisers. If these star cruisers were the result of the Thomas Moore Society one hundred and fifty years ago, then the New Men did not have a vast number of planets behind them. They might only have the Throne World. That would mean the enemy couldn’t absorb many losses.

  Yes, once Victory got in short range, they could use the neutron beam against the enemy fleet. That beam lacked the disruptor cannon’s firepower, though. The starship could work down a shield with the neutron beam, not simply swat it aside with one shot. There was another thing, once the star cruisers came in close range, they could annihilate the wrecks hidden by the present front sheet of heavy armored Star Watch vessels.

  “I’m betting the New Men don’t have a big industrial base,” Maddox told the professor.

  “Why would that matter to us here?” Ludendorff asked.

  “The New Men’s willingness to take losses might be dependent on how easy it is to replace destroyed star cruisers.”

  Ludendorff cocked his head, blinking rapidly. “Oh, I see. Yes, you’re right. It could make a critical difference.”

  “Heat up the cannon, Professor,” Maddox said. “We’re going to shoot again.”

  The professor closed his eyes, shaking his head. When he opened them, he said, “You don’t know when your luck has run out. We’re past the danger zone, Captain. This is red zone, lose the super-ship time.”

  “Do it,” Maddox said.

  Ludendorff heaved an explosive sigh. “As you wish, Captain.”

  Once more, the antimatter engines howled. Once more, the disruptor cannon sent its package of globular terror at the enemy. Another enemy shield went down, and massed Star Watch heavy lasers burned into the hull armor. Another enemy vessel died to the Fifth Fleet.

  Maddox’s throat was dry. He wanted to order one more strike. He’d helped take down six star cruisers. That meant eighteen enemy warships were left. What was the enemy commander thinking? Oran Rva couldn’t know each disruptor shot was a grave risk for Victory. The enemy commander might be computing the odds and what would happen if he kept the remaining star cruisers on an intercept course with the fleet.

  “Look,” Valerie whispered.

  Like ink from an octopus, each enemy star cruiser sprayed a red cloud before its ship. The twinkling clouds merged into a bigger field, blocking the two fleets, hiding the enemy ships from view.

  Maddox stood up, walking toward the main screen. “Explain what I’m seeing, Lieutenant.”

  Valerie studied her board, finally nodding. “The enemy is spraying some sort of crustal field, sir. As you can see, they’re spraying the crustals before their ships in relation to our vessels.”

  “The enemy isn’t beaming us anymore,” Maddox said.

  “Their rays mustn’t be able to burn through the crustal field, or not easily, anyway,” Valerie said.

  “What do you mean by crustal?” Maddox asked.

  “Tiny pieces of highly reflective matter, sir,” Valerie said.

  “To reflect laser light?” Maddox asked.

  “To dissipate a laser’s killing power,” she told him. “Oh, no.”

  Maddox’s stomach muscles tightened until it became painful. “What now?” he whispered. Had he come this close only to lose to a New Men surprise?

  “According to my sensors—”

 
; “You can see past the cloud?” Maddox asked.

  “A dim outline of a view, yes, sir,” Valerie said. “It looks like they’re running away, sir.”

  “What?”

  “They’re trying to get out of our path, sir,” Valerie said. “One half of their fleet is going right, and the other half is going to the left of us, sir. They engaged their engines. It looks as if the star cruisers are accelerating at full speed.”

  Maddox envisioned what that meant in terms of the battle.

  “They don’t want to go head-to-head with us,” the captain said. “The New Men will try to set up and rake our ships at long range.”

  “Maybe,” Valerie said. “Or maybe they’re just trying to get the hell away from Victory. Sir, I think you’ve intimidated the enemy. The New Men don’t like our disruptor cannon one bit.”

  ***

  The star cruisers fairly leapt away from their former position. Using the quickly sprayed crustal field as a temporary shield, they accelerated out of the Fifth Fleet’s path.

  Fletcher’s ships moved fifteen times faster than the star cruisers. That meant it was many times more difficult for the Star Watch vessels to alter course. They still headed for the Tannish Laumer-Point. In another few hours, they would have to begin braking if they wanted to use the jump point.

  The New Men vessels could alter course easily because they did not have a high initial velocity. Now, for the first time, Star Watch personnel saw how fast the enemy’s vessels could accelerate. The star cruisers moved away from the crustal field, becoming visible again. The enemy ships moved. Not only that, but they moved beyond the battleships’ long-range heavy lasers and beyond the star cruiser beam range. The enemy commander made it clear he feared the disruptor cannon.

  I used it exactly right, firing just enough and not one shot more. Only as Maddox thought that did he begin to tremble. He realized how close he’d come to losing the ancient starship and his life.