by Terry Mixon
The arrival of armored marines with their weapons out was almost hilariously anticlimactic.
They fanned throughout the compartment searching for hostiles. Two of them aimed their rifles at her, so she didn’t move. Someone searched her for weapons and then bound her hands behind her. That brought on an entirely new level of pain.
She looked up at the closest marine. “I need to speak with someone in charge. You’re in terrible danger. Commander Castille destroyed a battle station controlled by the ghosts. They’ll be coming.”
He didn’t look as if he believed her, but another marine arrived in engineering a few minutes later. He squatted down beside her and took his helmet off.
“Commander Giguere? My name is Major Russel Talbot, and you are my prisoner. Again. What’s this I hear about ghosts?”
She filled him in on what Castille had done in as few words as possible.
He cursed and turned to the man standing beside him. “Get everyone aboard the pinnaces. We’re headed back to Persephone in ten minutes.”
Kelsey already knew they were in trouble before Talbot called her. The FTL drone had seen the disaster.
The battle station just off the flip point was completely destroyed, but there were ships inbound. Two of them from fairly close to the flip point and others from deeper in the system.
Kelsey cut Talbot off as he tried to warn her about the danger. “You can’t leave the computers on board the recovery ship intact. We have to be absolutely certain that no data about us is left for the clans to capture.”
“I can destroy the computer,” he said, “but if there’s a tablet or data chip that has something I don’t know about, I can’t control that.”
“Can you destroy the ship by overloading the fusion plant?”
He shook his head. “It’s trashed. It looks like Castille tried to blow the ship up, but Commander Giguere stopped him. The resulting explosion still disabled everything in the engineering compartment.”
Kelsey turned to Angela. “We’re going to have to blow the ship up ourselves.”
“I don’t think that’s the best idea,” her executive officer said. “If it’s already destroyed when the enemy arrives, they’re going to suspect something. They have to see it blow up when they attack, or they’ll come looking for us. The closest ships are about forty-five minutes out.”
“I want the scanner records,” Kelsey told Talbot. “You have fifteen minutes to get that data and anything else of interest. Then I want you off that ship and on your way back over here. If we’re going to fight, I don’t want to have to worry about any pinnaces being undocked.”
“On it.” The com channel died.
“The closest two ships could be any size,” Angela said. “Even if we’re lucky and it’s only two destroyers, we’re still going to get chewed up.”
“We’ll bracket the ships between Annette’s fighters and Persephone. We’ll try to reason with them. If they shoot first, they can take out one of the hostiles. We’ll take out the other.”
Angela looked uncertain. “If we’re talking about a pair of cruisers, we’re in big trouble.”
Ten minutes later, Talbot sent the scanner data across. The recovery ship’s scanners were crap, but the reading of the battle station would still be useful.
The FTL drone was sending them data about the approaching ships. She still couldn’t be certain about the classes. There was a squadron of vessels about seven hours behind the lead pair.
“Talbot is undocking,” Angela said. “He’ll be back aboard in five minutes. The other pinnace just finished unloading the crew from the recovery ship. Talbot has our escapees, your mother, and the people captured with her.”
The oncoming ships were about twenty minutes away from the flip point. One was a destroyer, but the other was a light cruiser.
This was going to be more dangerous than she’d expected.
The other grouping of ships was still too far away for any kind of identification, but there were two dozen grav drives in operation. That meant there was going to be a higher percentage of capital ships. There was no way Audacious could take on that kind of firepower.
“Signal Audacious,” Kelsey said. “Carl has to come up with something to get the ship through to Pandora.”
“I’m sure he’ll do his best, but that might not be good enough,” Angela said. “He’s a genius, but there’s not a lot of time.”
“He’s got all those other research scientists. They have about six hours to get to the other flip point, modify their flip drive, and get the hell out of here. Tell them we’ll meet them there and hope for the best.”
It was one hell of a risk. If the carrier’s flip drive burned out like the cruise liner, they’d be stuck in this system. If the clans got prisoners, they’d eventually drag the truth out of them. Castille had left them in one hell of a spot.
“Five minutes until transition,” Angela said.
“Arm all missiles. We’ll give them one chance to talk. If they start shooting, we’ll take them down. If we have to fight, have Annette fire on the light cruiser. They actually have a stronger first-strike capability than us.”
Persephone wasn’t built to fight another ship head to head. They’d be lucky to take out the destroyer. The antiship missiles the fighters carried would be deadly at this range. Five fighters were a small group to take on a light cruiser, but that was the situation they found themselves in.
The clan ships paused long enough to make a pass through where the battle station had been located. The wreckage of the Dresden orbital had smashed it into pieces. That was sure to piss them off.
The two warships maneuvered into the flip point. Kelsey hoped they managed to avoid exchanging fire, but knew that was a long shot.
Annette tensed as the ships appeared in the flip point. Persephone transmitted a plea to stand down, but the warships opened fire anyway.
Their missiles completely shredded the unarmed recovery ship, but Persephone used electronic countermeasures to spoof the first salvo aimed at her. That wouldn’t work twice at this range.
That gave Annette’s people an opportunity. It put her and her wing mates in terrible danger, but she had to count on Princess Kelsey to protect them.
At this range, the antiship missiles on her fighters would tear a ship apart if they got through its defenses. She just had to hope the counter fire didn’t blow her fighters to pieces.
Without saying a word, she launched both her antiship missiles at the light cruiser. Her board lit up as the other fighters did the same. Ten small sparks closed the distance between them and the larger ship at a rapid pace.
Whoever was in charge over there had been ready for trouble. Antimissile railguns immediately swatted four of the missiles. The survivors dove in, but the defensive gunners still took out another two in short order.
The ship fired a swarm of missiles toward her fighters. That was gross overkill. If even one of them detonated in their midst, it would take them all out.
“Scatter!” she shouted over the short-range com.
Her fighters flew away from each other, and the light cruiser blew up. One of their antiship missiles must’ve gotten through.
Annette noted that one of the missiles had picked her as its prom date. Fantastic.
She designated it for her antimissile defenses and tried to dodge as they strove to take the missile down. Explosions behind her told her that not all of her friends were going to come home at the end of the day.
As focused as she was, she still managed to note the destruction of the destroyer. Persephone had killed him cleanly. No matter what happened to her, the princess was going to escape.
The decoys meant to distract the missile didn’t put off the one chasing her. Luckily for her, her other defenses managed to disable it while she was still outside destruction range.
Annette brought her small ship around to help her wing mates, but the fight was already over. Her fighter was the only one left.
40
Talbot knew the clock was ticking. If they were going to make it back to the multiflip point before the next wave of Clan warships arrived, he needed to finish recovering the survivors of the battle in the next half hour.
With only two marine pinnaces, that was challenging. Not only did they need to recover the people alive, they had to destroy the life pods. A bunch of empty pods would certainly make the enemy suspicious.
Thankfully—and he used that word advisedly—there hadn’t been that many survivors.
Honestly, he was surprised anyone had ejected at all. There couldn’t have been time to order anyone to abandon ship. Not that fast. The battle had lasted about fifteen seconds from the arrival of the Clan warships and their destruction.
The four pods he was tracking must’ve launched without any orders at all. No doubt the ship’s captain would have been quite angry, if he’d survived.
Persephone’s pinnaces had already caught up with two of the pods and were shepherding them back toward the ship. They’d use the jury-rigged docking envelopes to get the people out.
While the marines aboard the Marine Raider strike ship took the prisoners aboard from the first set, he’d led the effort to retrieve the second set of escape pods.
That task done, he docked and allowed the other pinnace to destroy the pods as they were ejected from Persephone.
Once aboard the ship, he made his way to where they were detaining the prisoners. There weren’t many of them. The pods were designed to hold dozens of people, but the makeshift prison compartment only had a dozen men and women inside.
His guards had them covered with stunners while the ship’s medical officer examined them. To his untrained eye, most of them looked a little rattled but relatively healthy.
Senior Sergeant Coulter—the most senior noncommissioned officer aboard the ship—pulled him aside.
“We’ve got something of a problem with the last pod, Major.”
Talbot stepped into the corridor so that the prisoners couldn’t hear what they were saying. “What’s up?”
“The guy inside the pod is weird. I mean seriously weird. First of all, he was in there by himself. Second, he’s dressed funny and has tattoos on his face.”
Talbot started to say something but changed his mind. “Put him in a separate compartment. Come get me when he’s secure.”
As soon as Coulter had moved away, Talbot called Kelsey.
“We picked up a surprise,” he said by way of greeting. “Based on the description, it sounds like we have somebody from The Singularity.”
“Seriously?” Kelsey asked. “Does this person have the same kind of tattoos as the woman in Emperor Marcus’s last broadcast?”
“That’s what Coulter says. The prisoner is male, though. How do you want me to handle him?”
His wife said nothing for a moment. “Make sure to have him medically screened and keep him in isolation. I want to handle him with kid gloves for the moment.”
“Are we going to question him once medical clears him?”
“We’ll let him stew for a while. Make sure that he has whatever food he requires, but don’t answer any questions. I’ll deal with him once the rest of the situation is taken care of. In fact, I think I’ll wait until we’re out of the system entirely.”
About that time, he heard the second pinnace dock. “It sounds like we’ve just finished up our work here. What’s the plan now?”
“We join Audacious and the freighter at the multiflip point. I haven’t been bugging him, but I hope Carl has some type of frequency-modulation unit designed for the carrier. If not, I’m not sure what we’ll do.”
He nodded. “Or what we’ll do if the flip drive burns out when we try to use it.”
“You are just a ray of sunshine. Audacious will beat us to the multiflip point by about an hour. By the time we get there, the second wave of ships will be less than half an hour from transit. We have an exceptionally small window to make our escape.”
“Do you think we’ll make it?”
Kelsey shrugged. “Damned if I know. I suppose we’ll have to surrender if we can’t escape. I feel very confident that we won’t be treated with kid gloves if that happens.
“What about the other prisoners? Are they in good shape? Does it look like we got any officers?”
It was his turn to shrug. “I’ve only glanced in, but everyone I saw was in civilian clothes. I didn’t see a Fleet uniform or anything like that. We’re going to have to question each of the prisoners separately and see what they have to say. There’s not very many of them. Only twelve.”
“I wish we hadn’t had to fight them,” Kelsey said. “Based on everything that Jacob had told me, these aren’t the kind of people we want to align ourselves with, but they didn’t have to be our enemies. At least not this quickly.
“Damn Castille and his idiotic stunt. It’s really screwed things up for us. We had to defend ourselves, but we pretty much assured that the clans are going to be our enemies.”
“You did everything you could to try to avoid this,” he said. “Sometimes you just have to accept that the situation worked out badly and do the best you can with the hand you’re dealt.”
“I’ll get over this,” she said. “Take care of your prisoners. I’m headed down to the medical center to see Commander Giguere.”
Veronica was finally settling into the tiny medical center. Thankfully, the place wasn’t swamped with injured. She’d heard the ship going to battle stations and launching missiles.
Probably against ships that were pursuing her after what Castille had done.
She felt badly about that. There’d been no need. She and her people had already lost. Getting the ghosts riled up was only going to cause them all a major headache in the future.
The doctor that had treated her stepped over to her bed.
“Good news, Commander. It doesn’t look as though you’re going to need a trip into the regenerator. We’ve been able to stabilize the broken bones, and you’re already on the mend.
“That’s not to say that your recovery is going to be easy. I’m afraid you’re not going to be walking around until your legs are in better shape. You certainly won’t be doing anything athletic until after your ribs heal.”
The shots he’d given her earlier had blissfully numbed the pain. “I’m done resisting, doctor. I’m just happy none of my people were killed.”
He nodded. “From what I understand, Princess Kelsey found a compartment to lock them up in. They’re under heavy guard—as are you—so they won’t be escaping again. You’ve given everyone quite a bit of heartburn over the last week.”
“One does what one can.”
The man laughed softly. “I suppose so. I stopped by to tell you that you have a visitor.”
Someone had come to ask her questions. Well, she supposed that was only natural. She’d cooperate. The time for resistance had ended.
The person who’d come to interrogate her was a surprise, though. Princess Kelsey Bandar stepped through the hatch. The short blonde woman wasn’t smiling, but she wasn’t snarling, either. Veronica supposed that was the best she could hope for.
“Commander Giguere, that was quite the stunt. I had an entire battalion of marines when I stole the Dresden orbital. You took it back with half a dozen people. My compliments on a brilliant plan.”
“I think it’s only brilliant if it succeeds,” Veronica said dryly. “Harebrained might be more appropriate for what happened. For what it’s worth, I’m very sorry that your mother was caught up in this. That was not part of our plans. Just her bad luck.”
“I’d guessed that from the timing,” the other woman said. “You had no way of knowing she was arriving as you were trying to sneak out of Audacious. I don’t blame you for that. In your shoes, I’d have done the same thing.
“That doesn’t mean that I’m happy with it, however. You and your people have proven yourselves to be entirely too resourceful. For the time being, I’m keeping you all se
curely under lock and key.”
Veronica chuckled. “I don’t think I’ll complain. We’ve already abused your hospitality once. I’m not certain when your doctor is going to let me out of this place, though.”
“When he does, you’ll join your compatriots. Let’s spend a moment talking about how you were injured. I’m given to understand that you got into a fight with Commander Castille in the engineering compartment on the recovery ship. One that resulted in his death, as well as your injuries.
“I get that you were fighting for your life and the lives of your people, but I’m grateful that your actions spared my mother and the other prisoners under your care. When the time comes, you can rest assured that I will take that into account.”
The short woman put her hands on her hips and stared at Veronica. “I wish we’d been able to convince you of our honesty. You would’ve made one hell of an ally.”
Veronica laughed a little until the sudden pain in her ribs stopped her. “Surprisingly, I was mostly convinced that you were telling the truth. Then the facility we found down on the planet proved it.”
Princess Kelsey frowned. “What facility? The town? Is that where you were hiding? I thought we’d searched it completely.”
Veronica explained about the hidden facility inside the volcano. Then she detailed everything they’d found inside it, including the journal and all the classified files.
“I transferred everything to a data chip,” Veronica concluded. “It was in my pocket when you captured me. It’s not encrypted. I hope it proves as educational for you as it was for me.
“All I can say at this point is that I know the AIs lied to us. I didn’t know that before, but now I’m certain of it. They’re enslaving us just like you said. I’m not certain how I can convince you of my sincerity, but I’ll try.”
Princess Kelsey nodded. “We’ll have plenty of time to discuss that once you’re feeling better. Focus on your healing while we see if we can get ourselves out of the mess that Commander Castille got us into.”