When relief came, it came so suddenly that Holden almost vomited. The drugs in his system stopped that too. He took a deep breath and the cartilage of his sternum clicked painfully back into place.
“Check in,” he muttered. His jaw hurt.
“Comm array targeted,” Alex replied immediately. Thoth Station’s comm and targeting array was the first item on their target priority list.
“All green,” Amos said from below.
“Sir,” Naomi said, a warning in her voice.
“Shit, I see it,” Alex said.
Holden told his console to mirror Naomi’s so he could see what she was looking at. On her screen, the Roci had figured out why it couldn’t identify the stealth ship.
There were two ships, not one large and ungainly missile frigate that they could dance around and cut to pieces at close range. No, that would have been too easy. These were two much smaller ships parked close together to trick enemy sensors. And now they were both firing their engines and splitting up.
Okay, Holden thought. New plan.
“Alex, get their attention,” he said. “Can’t let them go after the Molinari.”
“Roger,” Alex replied. “One away.”
Holden felt the Roci shudder as Alex fired a torpedo at one of the two ships. The smaller ships were rapidly changing speed and vector, and the torpedo had been fired hastily and from a bad angle. It wouldn’t score a hit, but the Roci would be on everyone’s scope as a threat now. So that was good.
Both of the smaller ships darted away in opposite directions at full burn, spraying chaff and laser chatter behind them as they went. The torpedo wobbled in its trajectory and then limped away in a random direction.
“Naomi, Alex, any idea what we’re facing here?” Holden asked.
“Roci still doesn’t recognize them, sir,” Naomi said.
“New hull design,” Alex said over her. “But they’re flyin’ like fast interceptors. Guessin’ a torpedo or two on the belly, and a keel-mounted rail gun.”
Faster and more maneuverable than the Roci, but they’d be able to fire in only one direction.
“Alex, come around to—” Holden’s order was cut short when the Rocinante shuddered and jumped sideways, hurling him into the side of his restraints with rib-bruising force.
“We’re hit!” Amos and Alex yelled at the same time.
“Station shot us with some sort of heavy gauss cannon,” Naomi said.
“Damage,” Holden said.
“Went clean through us, Cap,” Amos said. “Galley and the machine shop. Got yellows on the board, but nothing that’ll kill us.”
Nothing that’ll kill us sounded good, but Holden felt a pang for his coffeemaker.
“Alex,” Holden said. “Forget the little ships, kill that comm array.”
“Roger,” Alex replied, and the Roci lurched sideways as Alex changed course to begin his torpedo run on the station.
“Naomi, as soon as the first one of those fighters comes around on his attack run, give him the comm laser in the face, full strength, and start dropping chaff.”
“Yes, sir,” she replied. Maybe the laser would be enough to screw up his targeting system for a few seconds.
“Station’s openin’ up with the PDCs,” Alex said. “This’ll get a mite bumpy.”
Holden switched from mirroring Naomi’s screen to watching Alex’s. His panel filled with thousands of rapidly moving balls of light and Thoth Station rotating in the background. The Roci’s threat computer was outlining the incoming point defense cannon fire with bright light on Alex’s HUD. It was moving impossibly fast, but at least with the system doing a bright overlay on each round, the pilot could see where the fire was coming from and which direction it was traveling. Alex reacted to this threat information with consummate skill, maneuvering away from the PDCs’ direction of fire in quick, almost random movements that forced the automated targeting of the point defense cannons to adjust constantly.
To Holden, it looked like a game. Incredibly fast blobs of light flew up from the space station in chains, like long and thin pearl necklaces. The ship moved restlessly, finding the gaps between the threads and dodging away to a new gap before the strands could react and touch her. But Holden knew that each blob of light represented a chunk of Teflon-coated tungsten steel with a depleted uranium heart, going thousands of meters per second. If Alex lost the game, they’d know it when the Rocinante was cut to pieces.
Holden almost jumped out of his skin when Amos spoke. “Shit, Cap, got a leak somewhere. Three port maneuvering thrusters are losing water pressure. Going to patch it.”
“Copy, Amos. Go fast,” Holden said.
“You hang on down there, Amos,” Naomi said.
Amos just snorted.
On his console, Holden watched as Thoth Station grew larger on the scope. Somewhere behind them, the two fighters were probably coming about. The thought made the back of Holden’s head itch, but he tried to keep focus. The Roci didn’t have enough torpedoes for Alex to fire shot after shot at the station from far off and hope one made it through the point defense fire. Alex had to bring them in so close that the cannons couldn’t shoot the torpedo down.
A blue highlight appeared on the HUD surrounding a portion of the station’s central hub. The highlighted portion expanded into a smaller subscreen. Holden could make out the dishes and antennas that made up the comm and targeting array.
“One away,” Alex said, and the Roci vibrated as her second torpedo was fired.
Holden shook violently in his restraints and then slapped back into his chair as Alex took the Roci through a series of sudden maneuvers and then slammed down the throttle to evade the last of the PDC fire. Holden watched his screen as the red dot of their missile streaked toward the station and struck the comm array. A flash blanked out his screen for a second and then faded. Almost immediately the PDC fire stopped.
“Good sh—” Holden was cut off by Naomi yelling, “Bogey one has fired! Two fast movers!”
Holden flipped back to her screen and saw the threat system tracking both fighters and two smaller and much faster objects moving toward the Roci on an intercept course.
“Alex!” Holden said.
“Got it, Chief. Going defensive.”
Holden slammed back into his chair again as Alex poured on the speed. The steady rumble of the engine seemed to stutter, and Holden realized he was feeling the constant fire of their own PDCs as they tried to shoot down the pursuing missiles.
“Well, fuck,” Amos said almost conversationally.
“Where are you?” Holden asked, then flipped his screen to Amos’ suit camera. The mechanic was in a dimly illuminated crawl space filled with conduit and piping. That meant he was between the inner and outer hulls. In front of him, a section of damaged pipe looked like snapped bones. A cutting torch floated nearby. The ship bounced violently, banging the mechanic around in the tight space. Alex whooped over the comm.
“Missiles did not impact!” he said.
“Tell Alex to stop jerking her around,” Amos said. “Makes it hard to hang on to my tools.”
“Amos, get back to your crash couch!” Naomi said.
“Sorry, Boss,” Amos replied with a grunt as he yanked one end of the broken pipe free. “If I don’t fix this and we lose pressure, Alex won’t be able to turn to starboard anymore. Bet that’ll fuck us up good.”
“Keep working, Amos,” Holden said over Naomi’s protests. “But hang on. This is going to get worse.”
Amos said, “Roger that.”
Holden switched back to Alex’s HUD display.
“Holden,” Naomi said. There was fear in her voice. “Amos is going to get—”
“He’s doing his job. Do yours. Alex, we have to take these two out before the Molinari gets here. Get me an intercept on one of them and let’s kick its ass.”
“Roger that, Cap,” Alex said. “Going after bogey two. Could use some help with bogey one.”
“Bogey one is Naomi’
s priority,” Holden said. “Do what you can to keep it off of our backside while we kill his friend.”
“Roger,” Naomi said in a tight voice.
Holden switched back to Amos’ helmet camera, but the mechanic seemed to be doing fine. He was cutting the damaged pipe free with his torch, and a length of replacement pipe floated nearby.
“Strap that pipe down, Amos,” Holden said.
“All respect, Captain,” Amos said, “but safety standards can kiss my ass. I’m getting this done fast and getting outta here.”
Holden hesitated. If Alex had to make a course correction, the floating pipe could turn into a projectile massive enough to kill Amos or break the Roci. It’s Amos, he told himself. He knows what he’s doing.
Holden flipped to Naomi’s screen as she poured everything the comm system had at the small interceptor, trying to blind it with light and radio static. Then he went back to his tactical display. The Roci and bogey two flew toward each other at suicidal speeds. As soon as they passed the point where incoming torpedo fire couldn’t be avoided, bogey two launched both his missiles. Alex flagged the two fast movers for the PDCs and kept up his intercept course but didn’t launch missiles.
“Alex, why aren’t we shooting?” Holden said.
“Gonna shoot his torpedoes down, then get in close and let the PDCs chew him up,” the pilot replied.
“Why?”
“We’ve only got so many torpedoes and no resupply. No call to waste ’em on these munchkins.”
The incoming torpedoes arced forward on Holden’s display, and he felt the Roci’s PDCs firing to shoot them down.
“Alex,” he said. “We didn’t pay for this ship. Feel free to use it up. If I get killed so you can save ammo, I am going to put a reprimand in your permanent file.”
“Well, you put it that way…” Alex said. Then: “One away.”
The red dot of their torpedo streaked off toward bogey two. The incoming missiles got closer and closer, and then one disappeared from the display.
Alex said, “Shit,” in a flat voice, and then the Rocinante slammed sideways hard enough that Holden broke his nose on the inside of his helmet. Yellow emergency lights began rotating on all the bulkheads, though with the ship evacuated of air, Holden mercifully couldn’t hear the Klaxons that were trying to sound throughout it. His tactical display flickered, went out, and then came back after a second. When it came back up, all three torpedoes, as well as bogey two, were gone. Bogey one continued to bear down on them from astern.
“Damage!” Holden yelled, hoping the comm was still up.
“Major damage to the outer hull,” Naomi replied. “Four maneuvering thrusters gone. One PDC nonresponsive. We’ve also lost O2 storage, and the crew airlock looks like it’s slag.”
“Why are we alive?” Holden asked while he flipped through the damage report and then over to Amos’ suit camera.
“The fish didn’t hit us,” Alex said. “The PDC got it, but it was close. Warhead detonated and sprayed us down pretty good.”
It didn’t look like Amos was moving. Holden yelled, “Amos! Report!”
“Yeah, yeah, still here, Captain. Just hanging on in case we get knocked around like that again. I think I busted a rib on one of the hull braces, but I’m strapped down. Good fucking thing I didn’t waste time with that pipe, though.”
Holden didn’t take time to answer. He flipped back to his tactical display and watched the rapidly approaching bogey one. It had already fired its torpedoes, but at close range it could still cut them apart with its cannon.
“Alex, can you get us turned around and get a firing solution on that fighter?” he said.
“Working on it. Don’t have much maneuverability,” Alex replied, and the Roci began rotating with a series of lurches.
Holden switched to a telescope and zoomed in on the approaching fighter. Up close, the muzzle of its cannon looked as big around as a corridor on Ceres, and it appeared to be aimed directly at him.
“Alex,” he said.
“Working on it, Chief, but the Roci’s hurtin’.”
The enemy ship’s cannon flared open, preparing to fire.
“Alex, kill it. Kill it kill it kill it.”
“One away,” the pilot said, and the Rocinante shuddered.
Holden’s console threw him out of the scope view and back to the tactical view automatically. The Roci’s torpedo flew toward the fighter at almost the same instant that the fighter opened up with its cannon. The display showed the incoming rounds as small red dots moving too fast to follow.
“Incom—” he shouted, and the Rocinante came apart around him.
Holden came to.
The inside of the ship was filled with flying debris and bits of superheated metal shavings that looked like slow-motion showers of sparks. With no air, they bounced off walls and then floated, slowly cooling, like lazy fireflies. He had a vague memory of one corner of a wall-mounted monitor detaching and bouncing off three bulkheads in the world’s most elaborate billiards shot, then hitting him right below the sternum. He looked down, and the little chunk of monitor was floating a few centimeters in front of him, but there was no hole in his suit. His guts hurt.
The ops console chair next to Naomi had a hole in it; green gel slowly leaked into small balls that floated away in the zero g. Holden looked at the hole in the chair, and the matching hole in the bulkhead across the room, and realized that the round must have passed within centimeters of Naomi’s leg. A shudder swept through him, leaving him nauseated in its wake.
“What the fuck was that?” Amos asked quietly. “And how about we don’t do it anymore?”
“Alex?” Holden said.
“Still here, Cap,” the pilot replied, his voice eerily calm.
“My panel’s dead,” Holden said. “Did we kill that son of a bitch?”
“Yeah, Cap, he’s dead. About half a dozen of his rounds actually hit the Roci. Looks like they went through us from bow to stern. That anti-spalling webbing on the bulkheads really keeps the shrapnel down, doesn’t it?”
Alex’s voice had started shaking. He meant We should all be dead.
“Open a channel to Fred, Naomi,” Holden said.
She didn’t move.
“Naomi?”
“Right. Fred,” she said, then tapped on her screen.
Holden’s helmet was filled with static for a second, then with Fred’s voice.
“Guy Molinari here. Glad you guys are still alive.”
“Roger that. Begin your run. Let us know when we can limp over to one of the station’s docks.”
“Roger,” Fred replied. “We’ll find you a nice place to land. Fred out.”
Holden pulled the quick release on his chair’s restraints and floated toward the ceiling, his body limp.
Okay, Miller. Your turn.
Chapter Forty: Miller
Oi, Pampaw,” the kid in the crash couch to Miller’s right said. “Popped seal, you and bang, hey?”
The kid’s combat armor was gray-green, articulated pressure seals at the joints and stripes across the front plates where a knife or flechette round had scraped the finish. Behind the face mask, the kid could have been fifteen. His hand gestures spoke of a childhood spent in vacuum suits, and his speech was pure Belt creole.
“Yeah,” Miller said, raising his arm. “Saw some action recently. I’ll be fine.”
“Fine’s fine as fine,” the kid said. “But you hold to the foca, and neto can pass the air out to you, hey?”
No one on Mars or Earth would have the first clue what you’re saying, Miller thought. Shit, half the people on Ceres would be embarrassed by an accent that thick. No wonder they don’t mind killing you.
“Sounds good to me,” Miller said. “You go first, and I’ll try to keep anyone from shooting you in the back.”
The kid grinned. Miller had seen thousands like him. Boys in the throes of adolescence, working through the normal teenage drive to take risks and impress girls, but at the sa
me time they lived in the Belt, where one bad call meant dead. He’d seen thousands. He’d arrested hundreds. He’d watched a few dozen picked up in hazmat bags.
He leaned forward to look down the long rows of close-packed gimbaled crash couches that lined the gut of the Guy Molinari. Miller’s rough estimate put the count at between ninety and a hundred of them. So by dinner, chances were good he’d have seen a couple dozen more die.
“What’s your name, kid?”
“Diogo.”
“Miller,” he said, and gave the kid his hand to shake. The high-quality Martian battle armor Miller had taken from the Rocinante let his fingers flex a lot more than the kid’s.
The truth was Miller was in no shape for the assault. He was still getting occasional waves of inexplicable nausea, and his arm ached whenever the medication level in his blood started thinning out. But he knew his way around a gun, and he probably knew more about corridor-to-corridor fighting than nine-tenths of the OPA rock jumpers and ore hogs like Diogo who were about to go in. It would have to be good enough.
The ship’s address system clicked once.
“This is Fred. We’ve had word from air support, and we’re green for breach in ten minutes. Final checks start now, people.”
Miller sat back in his couch. The clicking and chattering of a hundred suits of armor, a hundred sidearms, a hundred assault weapons filled the air. He’d been over his own enough times now; he didn’t feel the urge to do it again.
In a few minutes, the burn would come. The cocktail of high-g drugs was kept on the ragged edge, since they’d be going straight from the couches into a firefight. No point having your assault force more doped than necessary.
Julie sat on the wall beside him, her hair swirling around her like she was underwater. He imagined the dappled light flashing across her face. Portrait of the young pinnace racer as a mermaid. She smiled at the idea, and Miller smiled back. She would have been here, he knew. Along with Diogo and Fred and all the other OPA militia, patriots of the vacuum, she’d have been in a crash couch, wearing borrowed armor, heading into the station to get herself killed for the greater good. Miller knew he wouldn’t have. Not before her. So in a sense, he’d taken her place. He’d become her.
Leviathan Wakes: Book One of The Expanse Page 38