Free Fleet Box Set 1

by Michael Chatfield

  I surveyed both floors with my visor open as I drummed my fingers on the metal of the armrest, making metallic clinks with each tap.

  Rick walked in, nodding to me, and I nodded back. He sat in his chair, which locked him into place with bolts—similar to those in the shuttles—as he made sure he hadn’t missed anything pertinent.

  “Two hours until engagement,” the combined arms officer called out. Even though she was a good five meters away, the Resilient’s sound conversion fields made it sound as if anyone was a few feet away—making the massive bridge, spread out as it was, feel as if it was the size of a corvette’s, allowing orders and information to be passed at surprisingly efficient speed.

  “Communications, begin the broadcast and defuse signal.”

  “We have weapon power ups!” sensor pit called out.

  “Send the command,” I said without batting an eyelid. “Tactical, shields—fire them up and put rounds into their shield generators.”

  “You’re online, Commander.”

  “Syndicate forces, this is Commander Salchar of the Free Fleet. This system is under our protection. Surrender and you will be sentenced according to your crimes. Do not and we will be forced to reply with the force necessary to detain you or to eliminate any threat you present. Do I make myself clear?”

  “We have a return broadcast.”

  “We will burn you and your planet, Human.” The Orvunut closed their channel.

  I turned to Rick. “Fighters?”

  “Flushing. Five minutes till they’re out.”

  “Weapons hot!” Marleen yelled as she checked over her preset targets. The Resilient’s weapons came online and began firing at battle cruisers Foxtrot and Bravo as well as destroyer Bravo.

  “Fighters are to target the corvettes. All ships are to take targets of opportunity. Combined Arms and Resilient, work to make sure we don’t hit the ships we need. Pass blueprints to gunnery crews. Comms, you running that jammer?”

  “We are online,” Comms confirmed as my orders were passed out. The Resilient bucked from her own weapons firing.

  “Shields?”

  “We’re programmed, ready to supercharge shields. Estimate a hundred and forty percent for two minutes.”

  I checked the status of the ships under my command. All of them were firing and most were just about getting their shields online. The Syndicate forces were still charging their weapons.

  I accessed Bok Soo and Shrift’s channel. “All right, go for the shipyard. Shrift, communicate with your brother and pass on anything useful to Bok Soo.”

  “Done,” Bok Soo said.

  I cut the channel and looked at the chaos in front of me. For now, the fight was leaning toward me, but soon the Syndicate would have their larger weapons online and my destroyers and below would feel it.

  I had put Kawaga in charge of the station, which was just bringing its bigger weapons online. Its shields would take a few minutes more than the weapons, time I simply did not have.

  I knew that pressuring him for a faster result would be useless. I turned to figuring out the best way to incapacitate ships by shooting them while my Commandos were still aboard.

  “Nothing survives contact with the enemy,” I muttered as my head twisted from screen to screen, wishing I was with my friends instead of watching who had the fastest charge rates and hoping that the Syndicate’s ships were damaged enough to take them out of battle, yet not so much as to harm my Commandos.

  I was dancing on the edge of a knife and I knew it.

  ***

  Commander Heston was similarly moving between screens as Stephenson came over his earpiece.

  “All fighters flushed.”

  “Very well, Wes.” He cut the channel.

  “Keep it together. Watch your wingman and hit those bastards where it hurts!” Heston yelled to his fighters.

  He changed to flight commanders in charge of four fighters a piece. “Cleo, you’re all over the place.” He watched over his fighters much like a bear would their cubs.

  God, I wish I was in a fighter. I understand why the commander is always getting in the middle of battle. His hands reached for imaginary fighter controls as Captain Xing reported his fighters were also in the dark.

  “PDS are online. Shit, Kar—” The line ended as the flight commander dealt with a renegade fighter going for glory.

  “Pass to higher.” Heston pointed to one of his three comms team members.

  He pressed an icon for a ship, connecting him.

  “Pull your head in! Corvettes and targets of opportunity—not some slow-moving PDS!” He cut the channel.

  God, I wish I was in a fighter. He repeated the mantra as he tried to keep his fighters alive by trying to yell down their ballsy moves while also trying to temper that with the confidence to do the ballsy shit they were already doing.

  “Bravo, Charlie—launch!” Wing Commander Three said as three Bravo and Charlie fighters fired their missiles and the entire wing veered off. The corvette rolled to displace the damage over its hull as the missiles detonated at a distance enough to rake the corvette’s armor and weapons, but not penetrate the innards, hopefully.

  “Good hit,” Heston said as the corvette powered out and away from battle, its one side cleared of weaponry.

  A fighter went down, then another.

  “This is not the time for showboating. This is the real damn thing,” Heston growled at them.

  The fighters stayed close to their wing member and only dived in close to deliver their missile payload.

  Heston felt as if he were riding a bull more than he was organizing anything.

  Someone overrode his channel: “Weapons firing. Syndicate are hot.”

  Then another override: “Shields are online. Premature detonation.”

  One of the comms personnel was already passing it up as Heston was talking to his fighters.

  “Get those shields. I will relay if any shields come down. Targets are shield generators,” Heston reminded them all. Their adrenaline was probably skyrocketing, no matter their race.

  ***

  Henry was listening to Heston’s comms. He was in the belly of the dreadnought.

  Already, he and the Commandos had a blueprint for the ship and were moving to the personal quarters of the Syndicate personnel. The Mechas had been locked away in the outer layer, with no communications. The Commandos’ plasmid blades served to quicken their progress to transports that took them to key areas of the ship.

  “All right, Commanders, we need these ships down. Their weapons are coming online,” he supplied as his transport reached the bridge of the dreadnought.

  “Commander, we can’t get in,” one of Henry’s platoon commanders at the bridge said.

  “Then go around it, and cut the lines in. We need to get this ship down now.” Henry’s voice was rough.

  “Commander,” the platoon commander said.

  Henry saw his forces were already cutting through the ship.

  Henry’s protection detail was around him as he walked off the transport and found a cubby to sit in. He checked the progress of his other Commando groups.

  Bok Soo was nearly to the shipyard. The groups throughout the Syndicate fleet were having varying levels of success. Some were engaged with Sarenmenti Mechas, others were working with them, and some were being wiped out because there was not enough of them to hold the ship. The corvettes were already taken—the ones that had been docked, anyway. The Commandos had them pulling back behind the station; it only took two ships out of the battle, and the least damaging ones at that—but everything counted at this point.

  “Verlu, Erkshaw, how are those battle cruisers going?” He’d put them in charge of two of the four battle cruisers that had shuttled their Mechas in exchange for the disguised Commandos.

  “Verlu here. We’ve just left the Mechas behind. We had to fight our way through them. We took heavy losses. I have people operating in strike squads running through the ship and causing as much dam
age as possible. Once the Mechas get free, we’re screwed. I’ll need reinforcements if I can drop this shield.”

  “Understood.” Verlu cut as soon as Henry acknowledged.

  “Erkshaw. We have taken the port gunnery. We were able to subdue the Mechas and are working to take out the shield hubs and cut power to the starboard.”

  “Understood,” Henry said as he passed their information to Kim In Sook.

  “Kawaga, are my Commandos loaded and ready to be deployed?” he asked.

  “Yes, they are ready and waiting. There is a core group of two thousand Commandos and seven thousand of the trainees,” he said as if commenting on a thoughtful novel.

  “Thank you.” Henry checked on Bok Soo, who was still an hour away from the shipyard. I swear I checked that two hours ago. Henry checked the progress on the dreadnought’s bridge.

  “Commander, I want you at the blast doors leading into the bridge,” Henry said, picking a squad commander who looked to be doing very little.

  “Sir.”

  Now time to prepare to have my Commandos leave for the other ships. We need to get those damned shields down! Henry stood and marched toward the bridge. He cut orders for his Commandos and trainees to lock up the Kuruvians in the same areas as the Sarenmenti. There was no knowing who was loyal or not and having a reactor blow up in his face was not high on his list of priorities.

  ***

  I watched as Syndicate ships changed from orange to red.

  “Syndicate weapons are online,” Sensors said as they updated which ships had their weapons online. First it was corvettes and cruisers, then the destroyers. The Resilient shook from impacts as every ship seemed to focus their fire on the dreadnought. When the battle cruisers and dreadnought came online, it was hard for me to not jump up to try to manage Tactical as Marleen was yelling to her gunners.

  “Shields are at eighty percent. Sixty-four.”

  “Marleen?” I asked, trying to hide the near-panic in my voice.

  “Roll!” she said.

  Helm rolled the Resilient, putting new shields and new guns in the line of fire as Brusk’s gunners let loose a full volley into every ship but the one Erkshaw and his people were on.

  “We have shield spotting!” Sensors said.

  “Get those shields down, Marleen.” I opened a channel to Heston. “Heston, I need those guns or, if necessary, those ships taken out.”

  “Hachiro is coming online,” Rick said.

  I nodded as I punched another channel open to Kawaga. “Hit the battle cruisers.”

  “Weapons are going down on the dreadnought. Henry is reporting command has been cut from the bridge. He’s clearing house,” Rick reported.

  “See if he can use those weapons against the rest of the Syndicate,” I said, remembering I was still live with Kawaga.

  The Resilient shook from another blast as Shields called out. “Forty-five percent and falling. They’re focusing on us.”

  “Prepare to roll!” I said, coming back to Kawaga. “They’ll turn their attention to you as soon as you become a threat.”

  “Yes, sir. I have removed people from the outer areas already.”

  “Good.”

  “Shields are spotting,” Shields said.

  “Roll!” I yelled as systems short-circuited, someone swearing as the Resilient shook violently.

  “Talk later, Kawaga.” I cut the channel.

  Resilient began reporting in her damage. “I’m hit in a corridor, sealed and contained. Systems rerouted. Also, in second gunnery deck, area sealed, hull weakened.”

  It had taken the firepower of the dreadnought, destroyers, and some of the battle cruisers to do that damage. Although it might be a testament to the Resilient’s defenses, it really showed how vulnerable even she was.

  “Destroyer Rising Sun has lost shields!” Sensors called out.

  I gritted my teeth. Zor’s gunnery team was giving the Syndicate hell, but the constant battering was taking down our shields still, shaking us a fair bit.

  “Get it to pull behind Hachiro to affect repairs.”

  “We’re spotting!” Shields called out.

  “Pull everyone to inner rings. We’re going to take a beating,” I said.

  Rick started yelling for people to pull back into the ship through the internal speakers.

  “Hachiro’s shields are up! They’re firing!” Sensors called out.

  The Resilient rocked even more as there was a grinding sound.

  “Taking hits,” Resilient said.

  Come on, we just need to hold out enough to drop Commandos on those ships. I stared at my screens for some edge. I watched as Hachiro’s weapons, nearly twice the size of the Resilient’s, fired.

  “Battle Cruiser Golf’s shields are down,” Sensors said.

  I could see Heston’s fighters were already moving for the ship.

  “Corvettes Ravage and Ashkul are down,” Sensors continued.

  I forced myself to watch the corvettes come apart. Battle Cruiser Charlie had turned on them with their massive rail guns. The rounds had punched through their weakened shields and cracked the corvettes.

  I watched as another took two hits before its shields gave way and the battle cruiser hit its bottle. There was nothing left.

  Sensors reported what I’d already seen.

  “Rick, have the corvettes and cruisers on striking runs,” I said.

  Kim looked like a woman possessed as she coordinated where Commandos were and where gunnery crews should shoot or were shooting.

  “Shields?” I asked. Resilient reported plasma rounds hitting her armor and burning into the second layer before chemical countermeasures stopped it.

  “Suggest we roll. Crews are working on shield relays,” Shields said.

  “Do it, Helm.” I watched the screen of casualties grow. Anger and pain filled me. I had to tear my eyes from the readouts.

  “The destroyers are gathering together with the cruisers and attacking Hachiro,” Sensors said.

  “Resilient, get me the senior commanders on those ships.”

  “On.”

  “I need those ships dead, whatever it takes.” I knew that my talking to them personally and saying those words would mean that more Commandos would die than if they took the ship normally. Yet I needed Hachiro. It was the only thing other than the Resilient that could take the punishment. I checked the status of my other ships. All of them, except the corvettes, didn’t have shields. Most of them had breaches and were leaking atmo.

  The Resilient shuddered as alarms went off.

  “Bottles one and two have failed. Ejecting them,” Resilient said, her voice becoming very electronic.

  My finger hovered over Eddie’s name for a second. “Resilient, what does that mean?”

  “We cannot maneuver, only shoot.”

  “Shields, I’m going to need you online ASAP!” I tapped the command chair’s arms.

  The dreadnought was still pounding us with one side, but only one other battle cruiser was joining in. The rest were attacking Hachiro.

  The enemy dreadnought’s guns went silent and it began to drift. The batteries started firing again a few minutes later. This time, their target was the Syndicate ships. The destroyers and smaller ships scrammed as they moved to attack their own dreadnought.

  “Henry here. We have the dreadnought.” His voice came in ragged breaths. Knowing the physical regimen the man adhered to, I knew he was wounded. I just hoped he saw to it.

  “We have taken down the shields on BC Golf,” someone else said over the main channel.

  “Understood. Good work,” I said.

  Things were now changing rapidly for the group of ships that were attacking Hachiro. My words had seemed to have the desired effect.

  A destroyer changed its IFF and moved out of the battle. It was a wreck. Three cruisers went dead as one corvette’s bottle let go, taking it and the corvette nearest to it out. Usually such a thing didn’t happen in space, but we were within each other’s p
ersonal space with everyone holding around Hachiro.

  I let my fingers hit the armrest a few times as the bloody screen from my constantly updating wounded and dead list kept growing larger and larger.

  “We have shields!” Shields said.

  There was a quieting effect, as all the hulls stopped shaking. The calm shocked me. I’d become used to the battering of weapons fire.

  “Use starboard shields to assist port,” I said as the corvettes and cruisers came in on their attack run, laying down fire into the BCs, which converged into a group, actually blocking one another’s line of fire. One BC learned this as it received a plasma round in its side away from the battle. It, like the Resilient, had used its shields pointing away from the battle to bolster its engaged ones, meaning it had no shields there as plasma ate into the hull. It took out the gunnery deck and caused an explosion before the plasma was finally stopped by countermeasures.

  The battle cruiser turned, moving out of battle slowly as it fired at Hachiro.

  “Rick, get the corvettes to focus on those engines,” I said as the cruisers loosed their missile racks.

  Stars erupted across the front of the battle cruisers as their PDS were mostly too slow to hit the missiles.

  “Shields down!” Sensors said as they ran off a list.

  Fighters are reloading. Cruisers also have missiles to take down the weaponry quickly. Cannons will put holes in them. Yet if they miss, then those Commandos will pay.

  “Resilient, send the distances for the cruiser missiles to take out the battle cruiser’s weaponry, and order to fire.”

  I opened Kawaga’s channel. “We’ll have an opening for those Commandos in a minute. Be ready to release them.”

  “Understood, Commander.”

  I waited on the channel as I watched my plot.

  “Commander Felur is abandoning her ship. The reactor is going.” Comms had barely finished when a handful of pods jettisoned away from Felur’s ship ResHin. The reactor was spat out and exploded, cracking the ship and killing any pods on the same side it was ejected from.

  Fucking poor bastards, I thought as my face remained hard.

  “Three battle cruisers are leaving the battlefield. They’re practically touching one another,” Sensors said.