by Chris Hechtl
“I see. I think that is wise,” the Neochimp replied in a neutral tone of voice as he nodded slowly “Upsilon?”
The Neolion nodded slowly. “Ar, most likely. We'll look into that after we pull out here. But first we have a battle to win.”
“Pulling up and moving is going to be tough. We've got some ships scattered all over the sector, sir,” Captain Baker warned. He left unsaid what damage they would take shortly. The additional damage he reminded himself.
“I know. For the moment, we will sound general recall. Make sure the order includes that they aren't followed and do not make landfall on any infected planets,” the admiral growled, logging the order.
“Aye aye, Admiral,” Kix replied with a dutiful nod.
“We'll need to keep the navy busy here though if we can't defeat them. So, I think we'll follow along with the empire's plan.”
“Sir?”
“Ar', burn it all and let the gods of space sort 'em out. We're all going to a dark hot place anyway,” the admiral growled. “We'll keep them busy on saving the planets. They want to be the knight in shining armor, let them. They'll drown in cries for help and try to protect these people while we slip away to better hunting grounds,” the admiral said.
Kix nodded slowly. “But first we've got to extract ourselves from this mess, sir,” he reminded him.
“Ar, that be true,” the admiral said as he checked the plot. He noted that instead of turning her wounded flank to the flagship the heavy cruiser was instead backing off slowly. “But something else be important,” he said, his index finger flicking out to point at the wayward ship.
“Sir?”
“Revenge,” the admiral growled as he dropped a targeting marker on Fancy.
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“I told you, we're screwed,” Lieutenant Troykov growled. “This isn't going to work. Not now. If the enemy was attacking ….” His voice began to rise in fear and frustration at the situation they were finding themselves in. He of all people knew how badly they could be screwed by their own side. There was also little or anything they could do about it at the moment.
“Stow it, mister, or leave my bridge,” Captain Layafette growled. He knew that the other pirates had realized the truth. That there was no point turning his wounded flank to the flagship to allow the admiral to use it to destroy him and his ship.
“He won't do anything, will he?” Commander Misaki asked tentatively.
“I don't know,” the captain replied slowly. “Comm, tell them we've got to slack our speed to make additional repairs,” he ordered. His plan to bide his time and then try to run in hyper, to get ahead of the fleet was in jeopardy.
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“He failed the test,” Admiral Ishmael growled. “Pity. Had he proven his trust I might have let him live a little longer. As it is … tactical, target Fancy and destroy her,” the admiral ordered.
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“We've got another ten thousand kilometers to go before we're out of Black Death's immediate energy basket. But she can still hit us with missiles for a good five minutes as we run,” Lieutenant Troykov said. “They might be busy with the enemy in front of them … or …”
Captain Layafette let a slight burst of hope color his own thoughts. But it wasn't meant to be.
The lieutenant's yelp was the only warning they had as Black Death's flank opened up with a full energy weapon broadside. The shots tore through Fancy's shields and into her armor. Black Corsage's fire raked up the ship's stern. The heavy cruiser writhed for a moment in the terrible fire of betrayal before enough axes of energy tore into her magazines, fusion reactors, and fuel storage bunkers. Something ignited and the ship was torn apart.
8116 tried to lumber in a turn to run but assault shuttles from the surviving warships spat out. They easily chased the unarmed ship down. Crews boarded her with blood in their eye and no thoughts of mercy for their fellow Horathians.
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Shelby watched coldly as Fancy was torn apart, and 8116 was boarded.
“No honor among thieves indeed it seems,” Cynthia observed as she came alongside the commodore.
“Serves them right,” Shelby said with a grim nod. “Something tells me they won't be spreading the plague anymore.”
“That is a good thing I suppose,” Cynthia said with a grunt. “If we let any of them out of this,” she said.
“Something tells me that if we push this, both sides will lose.”
“Live to fight another day?” Cynthia asked, eyeing her.
“I know a lot of people have paid in blood to get us this far, including Vlad,” Shelby said carefully. She saw her XO's nostrils flare. “We can rebuild. They …,” she waved a hand. “We know where they are going.”
Chapter 49
Shelby watched the main plot as Janice's forces limped away, getting well clear of the enemy ships as they fell back on the flagship. It had been a near thing she'd judged. Had she let Janice wander a bit closer into the enemy's engagement zone she would have seen even less ships than she did see.
She didn't allow herself the luxury of pain. Such things were a distant thing at the moment. As was guilt over choosing to allow the smaller ships to stand in the picket force instead of holding them back. She knew her conscience would haunt her later for that decision.
She had sustained heavy losses in her small ships. Of the four corvettes and five frigates, two of the corvettes and two of the frigates had survived to limp away.
Knife Dancer, Shrill Kill, and Far Sight had been destroyed. Sybil Harper had been crippled and was adrift. Most of the other ships in Janice's picket force had varying degrees of damage they were trying to deal with.
Half of the destroyer and cruiser's compliments of fighters had been lost, as well as most of their defensive drones. Most of the surviving ships were out of counter missiles as well. She was tempted to have them fall back on the munition ship to rearm the counter missiles at the least.
The interlude they'd just experienced while talking had served as something of a small breather as each side regrouped and dealt with their wounded as well as did what they could for their damaged ships. The peace wouldn't last long she knew, both sides were studying their opponent for weaknesses to exploit.
She had forty massive weapon and defensive drones plus dozens of missile pods around Prometheus. She was her Sunday punch … the most likely only thing that might stop the battlecruiser if her next attack failed. But to get in there to do it, her ship would take damage, quite possibly be destroyed. She was an officer, she knew the risks and accepted them, but that didn't mean she was ready to go with a desperate move quite yet.
Not when Admiral Sprague's CAG and the pilots about to move in were crazy enough to try their plan. “Comm, signal to the Carrier. Operation Swipe is a go,” Shelby ordered, then sat back to wait and watch.
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Boni was a bit worried about how things were going. She intercepted messages to the commodore and prioritized them. Most that could wait she shunted to the inbox. Others like key requests for the replicators she dealt with by getting permission from the commodore briefly, then pulling the keys from Shelby's database, adding her own half, and then sending them to the replicators.
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“Helm, bring us about and on course for the Tortuga jump point. There be no point in fighting this any longer,” Admiral Ishmael ordered.
“We're retreating now, sir?” Captain Baker asked, surprised but relieved by the turn of events.
“Aye. There is no point getting our ships torn up for such little profit,” the admiral growled. “We stick to the code,” he said.
“If they let us, sir. Long-range sensors have detected small targets on an approach vector. It looks like fighters, sir. But there are larger returns behind them,” CIC warned, painting the incoming tangos on the plot.
“Ar, launch fighters,” the admiral growled.
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“There they go,” Commander Coglin said, watching the eight gunships move out wide away from the group through his feed to the ship's CIC. A moment later Admiral Sprague began to spit fighters. The other ships began to launch their own fighters as well as the few orphans left to thicken their ranks just as the first of the bombers launched from the carrier. His ears were pressed down by the helmet on his head slightly. He turned as an alert light blinked and then nodded once to the deck officer as his fighter was hooked up to the catapult.
The Neocheetah saluted the deck officer sharply, then braced himself for the jolt as the fighter's catapult threw her into the void. Once he was clear of the ship, he signaled to the carrier and then banked his ship to survey the group as it formed up ahead of the bombers. “I hope this works.”
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Captain Gutt continued his ploy to feint damage with Black Corsage. When he saw the bombers on his scope, he was not at all happy. “All hands, the enemy has launched bombers from the carrier. Prep for a possible torpedo strike,” he warned.
“Torpedoes? You really think they've got them, sir?” Lieutenant Raz asked, looking up in alarm. “That's all we need …,” she said.
“At this point, I'm not putting anything past them,” the captain growled. He wished he had more than the pair of fighters in his boat bay to fend them off. “Launch fighters. Their target is the bombers,” he growled.
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Admiral Ishmael also saw the Mitchelle class bombers and immediately jumped on them as the real threat. “Captain, launch our own fighters to fend them off. Keep the fleas at bay; their bites outweigh them,” he growled.
Captain Baker nodded. “It looks like Gutt is one step ahead of us, sir,” he noted, nodding his chin to the plot. The admiral turned to see two fighters sprout from the heavy cruiser's boat bay.
“Good.”
“Sir, sirs,” a CIC rating said. Both senior officers looked up.
“Yes?” Captain Baker growled.
“We're noting gravity signatures in excess of normal on the fighters and bombers. We're projecting that both have energy shields,” the rating warned.
The captain scowled blackly. “So what else is new, they've got better tech than us. We've still got what it takes.”
“Sir, our fighters will be outnumbered three to one,” Theo warned carefully.
The captain turned to the Neodog. “Then ours will have to fight better, won't they?” he growled. “Tell them to keep the range open. Don't get in too close.”
“Aye aye, sir,” the tactical officer said. “Sir, what about the gunships? They are going to scissor us,” he warned.
The admiral's eyes cut to the gunships as they went wide and then turned to come back in at a different angle. “Comm, order the fighters to ignore the gunships; they can be targeted by the ships,” he ordered.
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The naval fighters and bombers under Commander Coglin's command moved in, but then did the unexpected, they fought defensively. Missiles went out from the interceptors to pick off some of the pirate fighters in the lead. The pirate fighters were not well trained to fight their own kind. For all of them it was the first time they'd actually done it; they were too used to strafing unarmed lubbers, shooting up ships to slow them down or punching holes in a space habitat. Finding a foe who could and did fight back and was better at it than they are was a bitter pill to swallow … for those who survived.
As the enemy fighters began to be worn down, Commander Coglin ordered his people to move in closer.
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When it was clear his fighter screen was being worn away, the admiral launched nukes in the path of the incoming enemy fighters and bombers, ignoring the threat to his surviving fighters. “Set the warheads to blow in their faces. Keep them at bay,” the admiral growled.
“We're now on missiles, sir,” Theo warned.
“Fight more effectively then,” the admiral growled. “Wait, how low are we?” he asked. Theo put up the numbers silently in a window on the admiral's number two screen. The admiral looked at the number and then grimaced. “You're telling me we've gone through three quarters of our missiles?”
“Some of the missiles are in the starboard aft magazine. We can't get to it; there was structural damage to that area and the loading corridors. The only way to move the missiles is by hand,” Captain Baker said absently.
“Then damn it, move them by hand!” the admiral snarled.
“Sir, I don't have the people to break each missile down into parts, then hand carry them using torpedo straps through the ship to the good magazines. Not when we're still trying to handle damage control,” the captain replied as a rating waved to him. “Yes?” he demanded icily, secretly glad of the reprieve.
The admiral scowled blackly but then decided to let the problem slide for the moment.
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Commander Coglin saw them coming, swore, and had his forces split tail in an effort to evade the incoming missiles.
The evasion maneuvers threw them off course from their intended targets however. It meant the gunships would be going in on their own.
Shelby had authorized only a single squadron of eight gunships in the attack. Each gunship in the pincer could only carry two torpedoes without significantly degrading their performance. And the enemy didn't know they had them as they moved through the enemy's outer engagement zone and red-lined their engines. Speed meant life at this moment, as did jinking, the crews knew as the three warships began to spit fire at them.
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Admiral Ishmael didn't initially recognize the threat when tactical and CIC reported getting target acquisition warnings from the incoming gunships. “Turn that off; they've got nothing more than just popguns!” he snarled.
“Sir, we should hit them,” the tactical officer replied, looking over his shoulder to the Admiral.
“What's stopping you? Do so, idiot!” the admiral snarled, waving a hand to swipe at the air between them. The Neodog cringed but then turned and barked out orders to his gunnery crews.
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“Fox One! Fox Two! Two away!” the lieutenant crowed as he pulled his ship up in a climb.
Six of the gunships managed to get into range of final acquisition to fire their torpedoes.
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“Vampire! Vampire! Multiple Vampires coming from the gunships! Those are torpedoes! CIC reported.
The admiral looked up in alarm and then over to the plot. He cursed himself mentally as he began to bark orders.
“It was all a trick!” Captain Baker exclaimed as they scrambled to deal with the unexpected threat.
Two of the incoming eight gunships had been destroyed by the sudden onslaught of weapons fire, but the rest survived to launch their torpedoes. Twelve torpedoes launched from the surviving gunships, eight at the battlecruiser, two each at the other cruisers.
The admiral muttered an oath as the captain barked orders. He suddenly realized that the fighters were a distraction; the enemy had anticipated that he'd ignore the threat of the gunships. He barked his own orders as Captain Baker tried to defend his ship and the others.
All three ships scrambled to roll their respective ships to present good shields to the incoming torpedo spread. The torpedoes had already locked on and had time on their clocks; they rolled with the ships. The rolls disrupted the ship's point defense, and it was far too close to fire counter missiles. They still managed to cut two of the torpedoes down.
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Captain Gutt realized he had to move quickly if there was going to be anything left to save at all. He lunged for Lieutenant Flynn's station and manually took control, thrusting the ship's engines past his imagined red lines to move in and defend the flagship while also throwing off the aim of the incoming torpedoes targeting his ship.
His maneuver managed to allow a startled Lieutenant Raz to pick off three more of the torpe
does in the run—one targeting them, two targeting the flagship. Black Death's crew managed to hit one more torpedo just short of it engaging its grav lance before the surviving torpedoes went off into her already wounded flank.
Three torpedoes managed to strike the battlecruiser, ripping down her abused shields with their grav lances and then boring into the hull before their main warheads went off, shaking the massive ship like a dog with a ragdoll.
One torpedo hit Black Corsage, penetrating her shields to tear into her guts. The two torpedoes that had managed to lock onto Crapshoot obliterated her completely despite the crew's best efforts to defend themselves.
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Admiral picked himself up off the deck slowly and woozily. He heard some cries and whimpers, the lights were almost completely out. “We can't take another hit like that, sir, the starboard flank …,” Captain Baker helped the Neocat to his seat.
“Report,” the Neocat coughed.
“The starboard flank is shredded. I'm getting reports in now,” Captain Baker replied.
“Get a handle on that now,” the admiral ordered as a crewman moved in to get a fire under control and then pull an injured crew member clear of the wreckage.
“How we survived that …?” the admiral shook his head, then thought better of it. He tapped his suit controls and had it give him a puff of oxygen. The pure oxygen burned in his sinuses but helped to clear his head almost instantly.
“Vent this smoke. Get life support on this damage,” the captain barked.
“Comm, open a channel to Black Corsage. Is she even still with us?” the admiral asked. He glanced at the main plot but the screen was dark.
“Aye, sir. She took one hit,” the comm rating coughed. “Crapshoot bought it,” he said as he put the call in.