The Wrong Side of Space (TCOTU, Book 3) (This Corner of the Universe)

by Britt Ringel

  “So why waste their time and resources in a losing proposition that has very little pay off in the first place?” Arnold summarized. “But if they don’t focus on starship combat, then why are they so adamant on chasing us? What’s their goal?”

  Lombardi looked knowingly at Heskan and answered darkly, “It is the same as ours.”

  “They want to find our home,” Heskan said. “Either through the memory of an infected or by following this fleet to our home space, they want to know where our population centers are and then start the type of fight in which they excel. Just look at how few marines Kite has left for your proof.”

  “Invasion,” Christova said, finally understanding. He shuddered coldly and then muttered, “They would be nearly unstoppable on a planet’s surface. Maybe it is best we went spinward after all.”

  Lombardi shot an angry look at Christova before turning to Heskan. “Commander, the danger is not that the next system we dive to leads to unexplored space…”

  “It’s that it leads us straight home,” Heskan finished. His voice took on a determined edge. “We can’t continue running. This has got to end, one way or another.”

  Chapter 12

  “I was getting a little tired of running anyway,” Vernay said. “I’ve felt like prey far too long.” She looked around the panels on the wall screen. “So where do we make our stand?”

  “Not here,” Heskan said and was relieved to see Lombardi nodding her head.

  “Too many of them are in this system,” Lombardi judged. “We also have no way of removing the Parasite presence from the moon. We have to find a system where we can completely eliminate them so they will not know where we went after we finish.” Lombardi looked at Selvaggio. “Lieutenant, in your professional navigator’s opinion, what are the chances the next system will be one controlled by your Republic?”

  Selvaggio looked down briefly before responding. “Low, Komandor. To date, our dives have been north, er, coreward. This next tunnel point will take us spinward, or what we call ‘east’ on our stellar maps but not far enough east. I don’t think we’re close yet. Not only are we too far west of the Republic, we’re also too far north. My guess is we still have several dives both east and south.”

  Lombardi spoke directly to Heskan. “Commander, this is your Republic we are talking about. Given Lieutenant Selvaggio’s remarks, are you willing to dive to the next star system in hopes of finding a more favorable battlefield?”

  “I am, Komandor. Komandor Christova’s initial estimation is correct. If we stay here, all we can do is die.”

  “Then we will maintain our course for the nearest tunnel point. That gives us nearly two and a half hours to figure out how to not die in the next system,” Lombardi said. “Options?”

  Heskan’s datapad beeped loudly. “Excuse me,” he apologized. He tapped his datapad and quickly said, “Heskan.”

  “Sorry to interrupt, sir,” Truesworth’s voice said over the speaker. “The cutters are on the move. They’re pursuing at point three-five-C. The super-carrier is still lagging behind as more cutters from the moon are docking with it. She’s filling up, Captain.”

  “Estimate on the number of cutters coming toward us?” Vernay asked.

  “It’s hard to say at this distance but upwards of twenty-five hundred.”

  “Plus whatever that carrier can hold,” Heskan mumbled. “Okay, thank you, Jack. Keep us informed.” He closed the channel.

  Arnold broke the silence. “We knew they’d try to close with our fleet eventually. Having them hold with the carrier was too good to last.” He looked upward and shrugged. “At least all those exercises in Iocaste won’t go to waste.”

  Lombardi smiled at Arnold and asked, “Are Brevic captains always so optimistic when facing such long odds?”

  Arnold returned the smile. “We’re used to them. Nearly every battle we face against you Hollarans has us outmatched.”

  “Then I am heartened that my valiant escort captains are not easily intimidated by a seemingly overwhelming force.”

  Arnold shook his head regretfully as he spoke. “We’ll fight the good fight, ma’am, but sadly, it won’t be good enough. It’s basic math and they have more than enough numbers.” He looked across the panels with a fatalistic expression. “Simple mathematics doesn’t care how hard you fight or how bad you want to live. We can’t stop two thousand five hundred cutters, even in a standard stern chase.”

  “You’re wrong, Alan,” Heskan said defiantly. He gestured to the petite woman across his table who possessed a titan’s spirit. “I’ve seen members of my crew fight impossible odds before and win. I’ve watched crewmembers refuse to give up well beyond the point where statistics dictated that they should already have been dead.” He looked down at the table. “Okay, traditional thinking says we can’t stop all those cutters in a typical retreat.” He looked at each face on his wall screen. “Then let’s be atypical.”

  Eyebrows shot up from every face returning Heskan’s stare. Heskan smirked inwardly at the reactions. Even Isabella thinks I’ve lost my mind.

  “It’ll be even worse if we attack!” Christova protested.

  “Rushing into suicide seems rather brash,” Arnold agreed.

  Lombardi raised her hand to stop the commotion. “What are you suggesting, Commander? Garrett, the more I get to know you, the less you seem the type who would thoughtlessly throw away your people in a suicidal attack.”

  “Oh, we’re still going to retreat, just not the way they expect. Or I should say when they expect.” Heskan glanced up and saw Vernay deep in thought. “Until now, we have run the moment we’ve dove into a new system.” Heskan started shaking his head as he grinned.

  Kapitan Vitale rubbed the side of his face as he muttered, “I am trying to understand you, Commander, but why must ‘Vic officers hide everything they say in vague phrases?”

  Lombardi answered, “Because he wants you to think, Kapitan. Good leaders teach as much as they lead.” She slanted her head toward Vernay’s panel. “Watch.”

  Vernay was mumbling to herself. “We’d lose the speed advantage and the disorientation only lasts a few seconds. We’d barely be able to react in time to use it against them unless we knew the exact moment they dove in—” Her face lit up. “We do!” She laughed wickedly and looked at her captain. Finally, she said excitedly, “We’re going to ambush them at the tunnel point while still at a full retreat.” She beamed proudly as she gazed at the other faces in the conference.

  “See?” Lombardi simply said.

  Heskan nodded at his first officer. “Just as we’ve always run when entering a system, the Parasites have always pursued. In fact, the single constant about them is that once their cutters have been ordered to attack, they take the most direct route toward their prey, without variation. We’re going to use that against them in the next system.” Heskan watched the officers in the meeting begin to work through the meaning of his plan. “A fleet is at its most vulnerable when it dives into a system. The crew is suffering from disorientation and their ships are traveling at point-one-C—”

  “But,” Christova interrupted, “the disorientation only lasts a few seconds, if the Parasites even disorient at all. By the time we can react to their dive, the effect will have worn off.”

  “Normally,” Heskan conceded. “However, because the Parasite cutters are so predictable, because they follow the same attack vector, we should be able to calculate almost exactly when they will dive out of the tunnel point.”

  “We wouldn’t even have to know, literally, to the second,” Arnold said. “If you’re suggesting what I’m thinking, we could be off a little bit and still execute an ambush while in full retreat.” Arnold considered the variables. “Risky though, it’s never been tried before. If we underestimate the timing, they’ll appear right in the middle of us. If we overestimate, we’ll be out of weapons range before they dive in.”

  “That’s why it’s never been tried before,” Heskan agreed. “Humans are
just too imprecise for an enemy fleet to forecast when we might dive into a system.”

  Lombardi nodded in agreement and continued Heskan’s thought. “But the Parasites… for whatever reason, they have attacked the same way, every time.” A smile began to form as she looked toward Heskan. “This could work.”

  “I’m still a little confused,” Vitale admitted.

  “Put simply,” Lombardi explained, “in deference to you, Stephan, we are not going to immediately retreat when we enter the next system. Instead, we are going to sail to a properly calculated position and wait.”

  Nuno’s captain still looked confused.

  “Then,” Lombardi continued, “shortly before the time we have calculated when the aliens will dive in, we will accelerate the fleet to point-two-C. When we hit two-C, the Parasites dive in—”

  “—Disoriented,” Heskan added.

  “—and we are in a position where we are retreating at fleet speed but still within our weapons range while they are recovering from their dive.” Lombardi evaluated Vitale’s expression for comprehension. “They are slow and disoriented; we are fast and firing.”

  “So, we deliver a hard hit to their cutters and then open the distance between our fleets while they begin to accelerate. Next, we perform a standard retrograde,” the Hollaran kapitan finished.

  “Exactly,” Heskan said. “This could give us an additional ten, maybe fifteen seconds of fighting time within five light-seconds.”

  “That is a lot of GP shots,” Christova acknowledged. His tone of voice filled with concern. “Will this not mean their super-carrier will be closer to us when it dives in?”

  Heskan nodded. “That will be an unfortunate consequence.”

  Lombardi waved a hand in the air. “The cutters on that vessel were going to catch us in the next system anyway.” She looked briefly at Heskan and added, “And as you said, we have to completely eliminate all Parasite presence before we can safely dive to Brevic space.” She looked down in contemplation for several seconds before stating, “This is it. We are going with this attack assuming the next system does not have an additional Parasite presence.”

  Heskan looked at the chronometer on his datapad. “Which gives us a little over an hour to plan.”

  * * *

  Kite was 2lm from the tunnel point connecting where they were with the system Lieutenant Vernay had unceremoniously named “Junction Two.” Their present system, Junction, was all but behind them and as Heskan looked upon the bridge wall screen at Lombardi, he could not help but feel a slight twinge of sadness in anticipation of his ship’s isolation in tunnel space. The ship captains had worked hard during the last forty-five minutes to devise and then revise an attack plan that put each ship in the fleet in as advantageous a position as possible. Contrary to standard Brevic group tactics, Lombardi had insisted on placing her missile ships in the formation of battle alongside their escorts. She had remained adamant, over Heskan’s protests, that all ships would be on the picket line for this fight. Thinking back to the many battles against Phoenix, he realized that the heavy cruiser had always placed herself in the heart of the danger, even when prudence demanded otherwise.

  So as to not tip their hand, the fleet ships remained in the only standard formation the Parasites had seen, with the escorts shielding their larger consorts sailing in a triangle formation slightly ahead of them. Upon arrival at Junction Two, the formation would change as the group decelerated to nearly 0c and reorganized into its planned “condensed square” formation with Phoenix firmly anchoring its center. The fleet ships would have four minutes to assume their stations before accelerating toward their planned initial attack point. That position had been carefully calculated and recalculated to guarantee the fleet would be only 4ls from the area in space where the Parasite cutters would appear. Complicating matters was the need for the fleet to be cruising at .2c the moment the Parasites arrived.

  “Are you ready, Commander?” Lombardi asked over the communications frequency.

  Heskan nodded. Behind Lombardi, he could see Lieutenant Selvaggio conferring with a Phoenix officer at his station. “I think we’re as ready as we can be.”

  “As soon as we have determined if Junction Two has a Parasite presence, I will issue the command to either continue our retreat toward the next tunnel point or to have the fleet heave to. We will not have much time,” Lombardi added unnecessarily.

  “We’ll be ready for Phoenix’s shuttle, Komandor,” Heskan assured. Although Phoenix’s bridge had been hit hard during the Sponde engagement and she had yet to receive reinforcements, the Hollaran komandor insisted on sending a liaison officer to Kite in exchange for keeping Selvaggio.

  “Which brings me to my next question,” Lombardi said. “You have mentioned that your ship lacks a sufficient number of marines. Phoenix has weathered the Parasite battles well, thanks to your ships. She is a heavy cruiser with a full complement of marines. I could spare a platoon.” She let the statement hang.

  Knowingly permit armed Hollaran marines on board. Heskan reeled. Can I allow that? He thought of his marines, fighting desperate actions against, literally, swarms of invaders. “One moment, Komandor.” Heskan quickly punched his chair arm console to open a comm request.

  “Gables here.”

  “Ensign,” Heskan began, “this is Heskan. Would you want a platoon of Hollie marines available on Kite for the next battle?”

  Silence.

  “One second, Captain.”

  Heh, Heskan thought, she’s kicking the can down the road just like I did.

  Moments later, she responded. “Absolutely, Captain. When you were running for your life back in Perdita, did you care who the operator of the flame unit was?”

  Good point. He shifted his gaze to the bridge wall screen. “Komandor, if you’re willing to part with them, Kite will gladly accept assistance from the Hollaran Marines.”

  Lombardi smiled. “They are yours, Commander.” She quickly glanced away from the screen and gave her familiar ”make it happen” nod. Then, an expression of what may have been apology flashed over her face as she confided to Heskan, “Just a word of caution, Commander. They play rough.”

  “Is it possible for marines to play any other way?”

  Chapter 13

  The nausea passed after only a few seconds. Heskan tightened his grip on his command chair and listened to the report from Ensign Meyer. “Dive complete. We have arrived in Junction Two.”

  “No buoys at the tunnel point, no beacons detected,” Truesworth supplemented.

  The system plot expanded as Truesworth’s sensor team worked to designate the permanent features of the star system. Junction Two possessed a rare Class F2II star with a luminosity approximately eight times as bright as humanity’s sun. Seven planets orbited the bright giant, none of them suitable for life. Additional scrutiny revealed four tunnel points present in the system. Once the basic elements were marked, the sensor section began the task of scouring for signs of other starships within 20lm. After several seconds, Truesworth announced, “Captain, no life on the planets, no starships detected.”

  “Conduct an additional search, Lieutenant,” Heskan ordered. “Let’s be sure.”

  Halfway through the second search, Lombardi’s voice came over the fleet channel. “All ships in the fleet will come about to reduce speed. Once the fleet achieves point-zero-five-C, we will proceed to Point Hope and slow to relative rest. Six minutes twenty-two seconds until estimated alien contact.”

  Point Hope was a mere 3ls from their current position. Ten seconds after receiving Lombardi’s orders, the ships of the combined fleet rotated into position and began to use their massive main drives to decelerate.

  Heskan looked down at his console to confirm Kite was ready for battle. She would be using her starboard batteries despite the fact that two of her three nonfunctional RSL turrets were on that side. The greater number of operational AMS batteries made it the obvious choice. Critically low on gunners, Lieutenant Spenc
er had stripped the LAZ C and D subsections to augment Kite’s starboard batteries to a full complement. The hard work and perseverance of the weapons section had resulted in the repair of all of the starboard AMS stations except -21, -23, and -25. The thirty-one gunners in the operational batteries sat impatiently in their duralloy turret cages waiting for Kite to unmask her broadside to the tunnel point.

  “What’s the status of the shuttle?” Heskan asked anxiously.

  Vernay’s cool voice was deeply reassuring. “We’ll have capture in seventy-five seconds, Captain. The fleet is scheduled to begin acceleration to the first milestone in one hundred twenty-four seconds.”

  Heskan tried subtly to exhale in relief. Real concern pervaded since a delay or mishap would place Kite in the situation where Phoenix’s shuttle was still outside the ship when the time to begin the fleet’s acceleration arrived. The time and speed milestones had been calculated to place the fleet 4ls from the predicted dive entry point of the Parasites while still sailing away from the aliens at .2c.

  “Shuttle capture,” Brown announced. “Kite is free to maneuver as necessary.” Ensign Meyer gave a quick nod of acknowledgment while Chief Brown opened a comm channel and added, “Ensign Gables, they’re here.”

  The time counted down and Kite’s massive Allison-Turner Type-88 drives lit off, pushing her bulk to fleet speed. One minute of hard acceleration, Heskan thought. Then we can rotate to face our batteries properly. Not a moment to spare, either. The aliens are due to arrive in ninety-five seconds. The Terran fleet achieved its condensed square formation. Kite’s position was the lower left corner with Vaettir sailing majestically above her. Curator held the upper right portion of the formation as Nuno sailed below the aging Champion class escort destroyer. Battle-ravaged Phoenix glided in the center of the square, positioned so that her fourteen Issic batteries were capable of supporting the entire formation. To his surprise, Heskan found the lethal heavy cruiser’s presence, a mere 4ls away, immensely comforting. We sure have come a long way, he thought.