Sergeant Eric McKinney found himself in the most unwelcome of situations – a vastly superior enemy approached from more than one direction and he lacked the weapons and numbers to do anything about it. The stream of expletives from his mouth was hidden behind his visor.
Chapter Fourteen
Response Fleet Alpha’s encounter with the Vraxar was going badly, catastrophically wrong. The enemy ships were carrying jammers which confused the targeting on both the Lambda X and Shatterer missiles carried by the Space Corps vessels. The guidance systems on these missiles were incredibly advanced and in some cases were able to adapt. Unfortunately, only one warhead in ten would lock on and launch.
To make matters worse the Vraxar had energy shields, against which those few warheads detonated harmlessly. Blake knew how an energy shield worked – hit it with enough high-yield explosives and it would eventually crumble. The trouble was, the response fleet wasn’t able to launch enough of those explosives to accomplish this feat. Nukes would take out a shield in most cases, except they weren’t carried by fleet warships anymore.
“The Hurricane isn’t going to last much longer,” said Blake. “Damnit!”
He had no idea how the cruiser hadn’t broken up already. Three-quarters of its hull was aglow, whilst the remaining quarter had simply disintegrated. The Vraxar ships carried an unfamiliar weapon, which fired a beam of dark energy. Where this beam struck, it caused metal to become brittle and fragment into dust. The ES Hurricane’s crew were certainly dead, but its AI continued on, firing missiles in sporadic bursts from the few clusters which remained active.
Two of the four enemy ships broke away from the combat, turning in a wide circle which suggested they were less agile than most things in the Space Corps. It didn’t really matter – their particle beams burned repeatedly into the vessels of Response Fleet Alpha. At the same time, the dark energy weapons came amongst the fleet and where they struck, millions of tonnes of armour plating and Gallenium engines scattered into rough dust.
“One of our cores has burned out,” said Rivera. “Kept it going too long, sir.”
Even in battle, the man was trying to score points. Blake told himself there’d be a reckoning soon.
“Load up the last core,” he said.
A short-range lightspeed jump wasn’t always intended for escape – it was a good way of breaking a missile lock or getting out of range when enemies threatened to overwhelm.
“Acknowledged,” growled Rivera.
“There’s another twenty of our Lambdas got a lock,” said Brady. “Firing.”
“For all the good it’ll do,” Blake spat.
The Hurricane’s resistance ended. A series of particle beams ripped into its centre section in an area already weakened by the dark energy beams. The warship split, two large pieces tumbling away from each other.
“Positron output at twenty percent,” said Rivera. “It’s gone.”
“We’ve got lucky so far,” said Brady. “They’re focusing on the bigger ships.”
“None of what’s happening here is good, Commander,” said Blake. “Is there anything you can do to get more of our missiles away?”
“I’ve not figured it out yet, sir. I think it needs more than a simple reprogramming from the weapons panel. The guys at the lab will need to fix this one.”
“Lieutenant Pointer, who is the most senior Captain left in the fleet?”
“Captain Kang, sir.”
Blake gritted his teeth. “Apart from Captain Kang. I mean someone who’s been able to figure out how to turn on the damned backup comms!”
“Captain Edwards, sir. He’s on the Undertow.”
“Tell him we need to order a withdrawal. We need to get out of here now.”
“Hold!” she said. “The New Beginning has come online. They must have worked out how to use the backups.”
“Speak to Captain Kang. Get him to order the withdrawal.”
It took only a short time for the message to be sent and the response to arrive.
“Sir, he’s refused the request. We are to continue with the engagement.”
“Damn the man!” Blake shouted. “What sort of fool is he?”
“Something just one-shot the Lingard,” said Brady in disbelief. Notes of fear clung to the man’s voice and Blake realised his crew were on the verge of outright panic.
“Focus, Commander!”
“Yessir! I’m trying,” Brady stammered.
“Stay calm and we’ll get through this.”
Blake patched into the weapons systems to see if he could help out. The missile control system had a thousand errors, with new ones appearing each time a warhead launch was aborted because of a failure to lock-on.
The Determinant was equipped with three Bulwark cannons, currently dormant. They weren’t intended to be used against anything other than missiles, but since the enemy showed no sign of deploying any, it seemed pointless to ignore their potential. Blake set the Bulwarks to track targets of any size. This facility wasn’t widely-used, yet it was disappointing to find Brady hadn’t learned about it.
The Bulwarks started up immediately, each of the three turrets thundering along runners which carried them through thirty metres of armour plating and into their external positions. An unmistakeable grumbling started at once and they threw thousands upon thousands of hardened Gallenium rounds towards the closest Vraxar ship.
“Tell the others to set Bulwarks to full auto and remove the target size constraints,” Blake ordered.
“Letting them know,” said Pointer. She sounded far more secure than either Brady or Rivera.
The targeted enemy warship spun away and Blake turned the Determinant to follow. Bulwark fire continued to crash into the enemy’s shields. With no way to tell how effective the attack was, Blake tried to keep close to the Vraxar. They were less manoeuvrable and slightly faster than the destroyer. In terms of outright speed, it was nothing that would put some of the larger Corps vessels to shame.
“They’re ignoring us,” Blake realised. He checked his tactical and saw that all four of the Vraxar were converging on the same place. “They’ve found the New Beginning,” he said.
He was right. The stealth modules were amongst the most effective technologies anywhere in the Space Corps. However, they weren’t completely proof against detection and were generally meant for scouting purposes or to allow a surprise attack. The Vraxar had somehow managed to locate the New Beginning and also realised it was the most powerful of the warships arrayed against them.
“Maybe Captain Kang will start doing what we’ve come here to do,” said Pointer.
Forced into action, the New Beginning shut down its stealth modules and put its extensive arsenal of weapons to use. Captain Kang had clearly understood the benefits of using the Bulwark cannons. The Galactic was equipped with seventy-two turrets, though it was unable to bring all to bear at the same time. Projectiles ripped through space, joining those from the Undertow, the Ransack and the Determinant.
With the New Beginning engaged, the numbers of missiles in flight increased fivefold. The Lambdas and higher-yield Shatterers exploded in waves against the Vraxar energy shields.
The Vraxar fired in response. Two of the dark beams hit the Undertow and another struck the Ransack. Particle beams flickered between the Vraxar and the New Beginning. The hull of the Galactic glowed as it absorbed and dissipated the heat.
“We might do this!” said Blake, his hands clenched in a death-grip on the Determinant’s control bars.
“I think the Ransack is out of action, sir.”
“Core two is fried,” said Rivera. “Disengaging core three.”
“Hold!” shouted Blake. “Lieutenant, please acknowledge that order!”
“Acknowledged, sir. Core three is still loaded for lightspeed.”
For a short time, it looked as if the two sides were evenly matched. The Vraxar energy weapons struck the New Beginning time and again, heating the heavy cruiser’s armour plating until
it seemed as if the entire spaceship was alight. As the Galactic banked and turned in response to the movement of the enemy, it left an orange trail for a thousand kilometres behind, like a meteorite with its own source of ignition. There were lights sparkling within the trail as dust from disintegrated armour flared up in the intense heat, before rapidly dwindling away to nothing.
“One of the enemy warships is breaking off!” shouted Pointer in excitement. “Come on, guys!”
A red circle on Blake’s tactical vanished and the Determinant’s AI overlaid a symbol to indicate the enemy vessel had escaped into lightspeed. He felt a surge of furious triumph. The New Beginning continued to soak up the punishment, exactly as it had been designed to do. Chunks of its hull were missing, exposing the dull grey of the engines beneath.
Then it happened. Without warning or notice from its comms team, the New Beginning launched into lightspeed, leaving the few remaining ships of Response Fleet Alpha to face the enemy.
“They’ve…gone,” said Pointer in disbelief. “The bastards have run out on us!”
Blake heard the words but couldn’t bring himself to make a response. Another vessel had appeared on the far edges of his tactical screen. It was far, far larger than anything else in the current engagement and its current course suggested it was aiming for the Undertow.
“What the…? That’s got to be the Neutraliser! Why has it decided to join in?”
A thought came to him – perhaps if the approaching Neutraliser came far enough away from Atlantis, power would return for the people on the surface. He didn’t have time to pursue the idea. An already very bad situation was in the process of going rapidly downhill.
“Sir, the Undertow has lost power!” said Pointer. “They’ve got comms and nothing else.”
The Vraxar warships closed in on the cruiser, their beam weapons raking across its hull. With its Gallenium engines shut down, the spaceship could do nothing to respond and it drifted at a speed of several hundred kilometres per second on a course that would take it into deep space.
“The ES Ransack has just dropped off the comms network,” said Pointer. “I have no idea why. Lieutenant Rivera?”
It looked like Rivera had more or less given up. “Hardly any output from them. Maybe they’ve been shut down.”
“One of the Vraxar is coming our way,” said Pointer. “I’ve fed the details onto your tactical, sir.”
The warning came too late to take action, even had the Determinant possessed a means of defending itself. Blake’s console lit up in a sea of red alerts. The bridge lights dimmed and an alarm emitted a shrill howl.
“We just got hit,” said Rivera flatly.
“Lieutenant, you had better get your crap in order!” Blake said. In truth, Rivera had already gone way beyond the limit.
Blake scanned his console to see what damage they’d taken. The cause appeared on his left-hand status screen.
[Particle Beam Strike, Aft Sections 15-28. Critical Damage to All Major Systems. Heat Penetration Into Main Quarters]
It was bad – very bad.
“We’ve lost rear engines and sustained damage to five Lambda clusters. Life support system operational with a predicted time to failure of fifteen minutes,” said Rivera, having evidently decided to offer some input.
“What of the soldiers we’re carrying?” shouted Blake. “What about them?”
“Dead,” said Rivera, as if he didn’t mind at all.
Blake prided himself on his calmness. Now he was beginning to find how difficult it was to live up to the reputation he gave himself. He swore angrily, the words flying from his mouth without control.
“Sir?” Pointer’s voice cut through the clouds of his fury. “I’ve received a message from a comms ranker on the Tillos base. He says they’ve been attacked by a force that’s come to steal the ES Lucid.”
Blake didn’t really have time to listen to this. The Determinant was badly damaged and the control bars shook in his palms. The enemy ship which had fired upon them was in range to do so again and he didn’t have any idea how long its beam weapons took to recharge. “The Lucid’s got no core,” he grunted, trying his best to keep his breathing steady.
“The message says it’s online, sir.”
“How would a soldier know?”
Pointer didn’t answer the question. “Captain Edwards on the Undertow has issued the order to withdraw,” she said. “Except they have no power to go to lightspeed themselves.”
“About time we got out of here,” said Rivera, galvanised by the news. “I’m taking us back to the Juniper.”
Blake’s mind raced. The Lucid was meant to have no Obsidiar core. If it was still running, that meant the work hadn’t been done yet. The shipyard records stated the core had already been removed, but it wasn’t entirely unheard of for these records to be subjected to a few subtle amendments or even to tell a few outright lies in order to ensure project milestones were met.
On his tactical, the closest Vraxar warship came to within one hundred thousand kilometres. A few missiles sputtered towards it, but it was clear the engagement was over. The huge, unknown Vraxar spaceship was now a good distance from Atlantis, its crew having evidently decided they needed to come for a closer look at the human fleet.
With his mind made up, Blake reached out with a finger and pressed at an area on his console.
“I’m locked out of my panel!” shouted Rivera.
“We’re going to Atlantis. We need the Lucid.”
“We are not going to Atlantis, sir! Captain Edwards has ordered us to withdraw!” Droplets of spittle flew from Lieutenant Rivera’s mouth, a tiny cloud of them falling over his now-dead console.
“Sit down, Lieutenant! That’s an order!”
“No, sir! I will not sit down!”
Rivera lunged across the intervening space, his hands open and reaching for Blake. With a final sweep of his index finger, Blake activated an SRT. The entire ship juddered and something shrieked deep in the hull. Blake noted they’d taken a second particle beam strike. The Determinant’s life support modules were too badly damaged to keep the ship’s interior stable and the transition to lightspeed was sickeningly violent.
Three of the crew were seated, whilst Lieutenant Rivera was on his feet. When the Determinant entered lightspeed, he was thrown across the floor of the bridge and into the rear bulkhead wall with a tremendous thump. The others were pressed hard into their seats and Blake felt something stretch within his ribcage.
The warship emerged from lightspeed, hardly any time after entry. The alarm siren continued to sound and the alerts on Blake’s console had multiplied until there was no screen which wasn’t covered in them, each warning vying for his attention.
Fighting against the overwhelming urge to be sick, Blake struggled to focus his mind. The control bars were unresponsive in his hands. He pushed and pulled at them, before realising their connection to the engines had failed. The altimeter showed they were at a height of five thousand kilometres and heading in rapidly. The SRT had brought them in closer to the surface than he’d intended.
“Where are we?” he asked, the words coming out thickly.
Lieutenant Pointer didn’t answer at once. He looked across and saw her rousing. “One second,” she mumbled.
“Quickly!” he urged, his voice stronger. “Find me the Tillos base!”
“Coming in fast,” she said.
Blake glanced to his other side. Lieutenant Brady was still in his chair with his eyes closed. Blood trickled from his mouth and one of his ears. He didn’t move and there was no indication whether he was alive or dead.
“Our altitude is four thousand klicks,” said Pointer.
“We don’t have enough power to slow down. There’s less than five percent of our engine output available.”
He worked hard at it. The autopilot wouldn’t activate, either because the AI knew there wasn’t enough power to stop them crash landing or because the system had failed. He attempted an override �
� the core wouldn’t accept his authorisation codes. He tried to force it to restart the manual control system. Everything was running much slower than usual and it took him seconds to get a response.
“Three thousand klicks. Forward sensor feed now available.”
The bulkhead screen showed nothing but a blur of colours, ever-changing and shifting. Abruptly, it cleared to show the planet Atlantis below, a paradise of oceans and forests. Then the image returned to the distracting blurred mess again.
“Turn it off,” said Edwards.
The left control bar jerked in his hand. He pulled at it firmly, producing a thunderous vibration which shook the ES Determinant violently. The right-hand bar shuddered too, fighting in his hand as he attempted to exert some control over the plunging warship.
“There goes two thousand klicks. We’re coming up on the Tillos base, sir, or what little remains of it.”
At an altitude of fifteen hundred kilometres, Blake felt the ship respond to his commands. It was sluggish and reluctant, but it did its best to obey. The safest course of action would be to bring the Determinant in to land as slowly and steadily as possible. On the other hand, everything was failing and Blake was increasingly aware of the passing time – the Vraxar might not have guessed the Determinant had made for Atlantis, but they would surely have detected the faint double fission signature of the short-range transit.
“We’re coming in,” he said. “Hold on.”
At five hundred kilometres, there was a new noise to add to that of the siren and the howling engines. It took Blake a moment to realise what it was.
“The underside Bulwark is firing at something.”
He tried to look at his tactical screen from his periphery. There was nothing showing on it, so he dismissed the Bulwark’s firing as a symptom of the warship’s operational degradation.
In spite of his best efforts to bring the Determinant down on the cratered surface of the Tillos landing field, Blake overshot, flying over at a height of a few hundred metres. The engines failed entirely and the Determinant fell into a dive. With no way to control it, Captain Charlie Blake and Lieutenant Caz Pointer braced for impact.
Negation Force (Obsidiar Fleet Book 1) Page 12