Interceptor (Strike Commander Book 2)

by Richard Tongue

   “What's going on?” she asked.

   “Energy spike,” he said. “Three Corsairs just launched from the enemy base. So far they're just holding position, but I thought it best to bring the ship to alert in case this was the start of anything.” Glancing at the sensor display, he added, “I've run a full sweep of local space. No sign of any other activity, and no dimensional instability from the hendecaspace point.”

   “You haven't left me much to do, Mo,” she replied, settling down in her chair. “Try and contact the surface, and inform them that all shuttle traffic is grounded until further notice. And I want the Spearfish flight on immediate notice to scramble.”

   “Yes, ma'am,” he replied, turning back to his station. Beside him, the door opened, and Zharkova walked onto the bridge, quietly moving to the side of the door, glancing across at the sensor display.

   “What are you doing here?” Mallory asked. “This is a restricted area.”

   “I'm not going to do any good sitting in my quarters,” she replied. “I thought I could help.”

   “Well…,” Mallory began, but Finch interrupted her.

   “Signal, Captain, from the pirate base. They want to speak to you, by name.”

   Raising an eyebrow, she replied, “Famous at last. Put them on, Lieutenant.”

   Dubois appeared on the screen, a scowling figure over his shoulder, looking on. This time he was sitting in an office, one that might have been that of the commanding officer of any Triplanetary installation, right down to the holoimage of the President on the wall.

   “I see you're dropping the smokescreen,” Mallory said. “What do you want, Dubois?”

   “I have one of your officers,” he said, folding his fingers together. “That seems to be the beginnings of a basis for an agreement.”

   Sitting back on her chair, Mallory said, “I think I can bring this conversation to an end very quickly. I have no intention of negotiating with terrorists, Dubois, and I will not make any deals, any offers in exchange for the life of Ensign Morgan.” She smiled, then added, “I will, of course, guarantee your safety should you opt to immediately surrender your facility to me.”

   “Not in a million years,” the angry man behind Dubois grunted. “You should be surrendering to us.”

   “I thought you might be more flexible than Captain Conway,” Dubois said. “I would point out that I am also an officer of the Triplanetary Fleet, and that you, according to the records I have, are currently wanted on charges of treason, piracy and murder. I might be in a position to assist you in getting those charges lifted, in addition to the safe return of Ensign Morgan. My terms are very simple.” He glanced over his shoulder, and said, “You will leave the system immediately. In exchange, I will release all of my prisoners to the local planetary authority.”

   “Else we'll launch an attack,” the other man said, “and not only will we win, but we'll reduce that antique ship of yours to scrap metal. Don't think we won't do it.”

   Mallory, her face straight, replied, “This isn't just another civilian freighter like that hulk floating in orbit. You're addressing the commander of a capital ship of the Triplanetary Fleet, our current status notwithstanding. It would take something a lot stronger than idle threats to force me to surrender.”

   “I'm afraid that I must introduce time constraints to this offer. If you do not break orbit in the next twelve hours, I will be forced to take actions that I think we will both find abhorrent. There is a lot more at stake here than the life of a single crewman, and I'll have no compunction about doing anything necessary to complete my mission. Twelve hours, Captain. Dubois out.”

   “Twelve hours?” Finch asked. “What can we possibly do in twelve hours? We can't leave the system for sixty-five, and he must know that.” Turning to Mallory, he asked, “Do you think he's giving us an offer that he knows we can't accept, ma'am?”

   “Possibly,” Mallory mused. “Though I wouldn't accept if he'd given us a hundred and twenty, and he must know that as well.”

   “Twelve hours,” Zharkova said. “Maybe that deadline doesn't have anything to do with us.”

   “If he had reinforcements coming, he wouldn't bother warning us,” Finch replied. “He'd just sit tight and wait to wipe us out.”

   “Unless he's trying to warn us,” Zharkova said. “Do we actually know what his mission is, or is everyone just assuming?”

   Taking a deep breath, Mallory said, “None of that matters. I certainly have no intention of yielding to his demands, and I wouldn't trust him for a second to keep his end of the bargain if I did.”

   “Enemy fighters are still maintaining position,” Sullivan said. “Based on my assessment, they can hold station for up to twenty hours without resupply, though I wouldn't like to be stuck in that cramped cabin for that long. Maybe he thinks we've got reinforcements on the way.”

   “If we do, no one told me about it,” Mallory replied. She tapped a control, bringing up an image of the base again, and said, “We've got to take that base, and now we know that we have to do it at some point in the next twelve hours.”

   “Maybe that's the idea,” Zharkova suggested. “Left to ourselves, we'd take our time...”

   “We?” Finch asked.

   “We would take our time in preparing an attack strategy,” Zharkova added. “Now he's forcing us to move before we're ready.” She smiled, and said, “A negotiating tactic I've used myself on more than one occasion, if I'm honest. It can be surprisingly effective.”

   Turning to her, Mallory replied, “You might have a point, at that. I've been going over those plans since we did the flyby, and I can't see any way to break into that base. If we launch a fighters strike, they'll be able to overwhelm our attack force, even if we use Churchill in support. They don't have to launch an attack on us to win, either.”

   “There aren't any other ships scheduled into the system for a couple of weeks,” Sullivan added. “No urgency there. They can just sit there and wait us out, and there's nothing we can do about it while that fighter screen is in position.”

   “And if it isn't?” Mallory asked, a smile spreading across her face. “What if we pull the fighters away from the base, offering them a target they don't dare resist.” Turning to Sullivan, she added, “Such as reinforcements on the way, a task force dispatched by Triplanetary Intelligence to finish them off.”

   “That might work,” Finch said. “They'd have to scramble everything they had, try and hit them before they could organize. That's what I would do, anyway.” He looked around, shook his head, then added, “Not that it would do any good, though. Once they realize that they've been fooled, they'll abort the mission and return to base.”

   Tapping the sensor display, Mallory added, “We could delay them a while. Churchill could generate a dimensional tear without actually passing through it, as long as we were careful.” Pointing at the far hendecaspace point, she added, “That's in a sensor blind spot for them. They'd know that someone had opened a rift, and they'd know that we hadn't left the system. They couldn't take the risk.” Shaking her head, she said, “Except that still gives them too much of an opportunity to bring back their fighters, and we wouldn't be in a position to launch any sort of a strike.”

   “What about launching from the surface?” Clayton asked. “With boosters, the squadron should be able to make it without too much trouble. That will give them an attack on a vector they aren't expecting...”

   “And the enemy squadron will still be able to intercept them at a time of their choosing, when they have all the support from the base that they need to overwhelm us,” Sullivan replied. “That isn't the answer. We've not only got to lure them away from the base, we've got to do it in such a way that we can take immediate advantage of the situation. If we can't get our fighters in first, it'll just be a waste of time and lives.”

   Frowning at the display, Zharkova said, “That freighter. How badly damage
d is it?”

   “A total wreck,” Sullivan replied, shaking his head. “I already thought of that. Patch it up enough to make a jump, then use it to bring in reinforcements from Belzoni.” Turning to Mallory, he added, “It'd take weeks to get it into condition to take the risk. By then all of this will be over, one way or another.”

   “Agreed,” Mallory said.

   Shaking her head, Zharkova replied, “What about the storage bays, the cargo airlocks?”

   Frowning, Sullivan called up the engineering report, and answered, “All the storage bays are intact, and the cargo airlocks are repairable with the tools we've got on hand. Possibly.”

   “Give me a work crew,” the union activist replied, “and I'll have them fully operational in eight hours. Well within the deadline.” She pointed at the transport, hanging in orbit close to the enemy base. “What exactly is stopping us using it to hide a fighter squadron? We could fit those Vulcans inside the storage bays easily, and take them in through the cargo airlocks.” Enthusiasm crept into her voice as she stepped forward, adding, “If we moved Churchill close enough, we could move them across unpowered, and they wouldn't see a thing. We could put another crew on the outer drive, make it look as though we're trying to repair it.”

   “Then what?” Finch asked.

   Turning to her with a smile on her face, Mallory replied, “Then we execute the decoy plan as intended, with the exception that we'll have a squadron ready to make an attack run less than thirty seconds from the target. Which means that as long as we can drag the Corsairs at least, say three minutes' flight from home, they'll have enough time to launch an attack run that will knock out the ground defenses permanently.”

   Nodding, Sullivan added, “With a little work, that freighter is within missile range.” Glancing at Clayton, he added, “Those boosters you were talking about. Any reason we can't use them on our ship-to-surface missiles? It's not as if they have to counter evasive action.”

   “No reason at all,” Mallory replied. She glanced up at the clock, and said, “We've got a lot of work to do, and almost no time to get it done. Finch, I want you to start work on adapting eight missiles as directed, and work out some way to improvise a launch mechanism for them. Something that won't show until we use it.”

   “Not a problem,” the young officer replied.

   Turning to Zharkova, she continued, “I'll sign an order commandeering that ship immediately. Given that it'll make the Fleet responsible for any repairs, I doubt the owners will object. Were you serious when you said that you could get the job done in the time?”

   “As I said, I don't spend all my time sitting behind a desk. I think I still know my way around a servo-spanner. Give me Jackie and a couple of eager technicians, and I'll get it done for you.”

   Nodding, Mallory said, “You realize, of course, that I cannot send a civilian into this sort of a situation, certainly not in a role where they would be in command of military personnel. Technically in charge of a ship that has been brought into the Triplanetary Fleet, no matter how temporarily.”

   “Damn it, Captain, do we have time for this? We're counting minutes, and if I'm going to get that ship into condition, I need every one of them.”

   Taking a deep breath, Mallory replied, “Not in a million years did I think I would ever end up doing this, but I'm officially reactivating you, and granting you,” she shook her head, sighing, “a field commission. If you let me down, I'll skin you alive, Sub-Lieutenant.” Gesturing at the hatch, she added, “Now get moving. Take what you need from the ship's stores, and start work. Organize the decoy team on the outer hull while you are at it. Don't use anyone that the Chief needs over here to get the fighters ready.”

   “Yes, ma'am,” Zharkova said, snapping a shoddy salute before running from the bridge, Finch looking after her, his eyes still wide.

   “Don't take this the wrong way,” Sullivan asked, “but do you think that was wise?”

   “Probably not, but she came up with the idea. It only seems fair to give her the first crack at executing it.” With a faint smile, Mallory added, “Besides, she might have been an insubordinate ass, but she was good enough to keep her in uniform.” Sitting back in her chair, she continued, “Now, all we've got to do is find a way to convince them that we've got friends coming into the system. Get me Conway. I've got a job for him.”

  Chapter 12

   Morgan took the metal tray from the food dispenser, Larson watching her every move as she made her way over to the nearest table, sitting down opposite Medina, the other occupants of the table looking up at her. With a smile, she reached for a fork and snatched a piece of crumbling meat, grimacing at the over-spiced chicken, a pasty taste that demonstrated the inefficiencies of the food fabricator.

   Medina glanced at the people sitting with her. She gestured to her left, and said, “This is Alexander Long. He was the prospector pilot who worked with your new boss.”

   “I'm Sokolov,” the other said. “Communications technician.”

   “Valerie Harper. Espatier and archaeologist, and that's a long story.”

   “Having a nice little talk, I hope,” Larson said, walking over to the table. “Because all of you are on the clock, and in fifteen minutes you're all going to leave whether you've finished or not.” He shook his head, then moved back to the door, the evil smile still fixed on his face.

   “What's his problem?” Morgan asked, shaking her head.

   “There are worse people here,” Medina said. “Take my word for it. Larson is the least of our problems.” Another group of prisoners walked into the room, and as their guard moved to harass them, she whispered, “Is what you said true about your ship? Are they planning to rescue us?”

   “Undoubtedly, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try and help ourselves, as well.” Glancing around the room, she asked, “What do you know about this place?”

   “A standard temporary base,” Sokolov said. “They dropped it on top of the alien base when they found it, and built up the defenses around it.”

   “And,” Larson said, moving behind her, “Completely impervious to any attempts to escape.” Gesturing at the corridor, he said, “If you want to try and get back to your ship, I'll be happy to escort you to the airlock, but I think you might not enjoy the walk very much.”

   “How are you doing down in the ruins?” Long asked, nervously looking up as the guard walked back to the door. “I only went down there once, and it was terrifying. It felt as though something down there was waiting to jump out at me.”

   “Nothing's lived down there for thousands of years,” she replied. “It's an amazing site, but I think it could take years for us to study it properly, especially with the resources we have.”

   “Years?” Long said, shaking his head. “I have a wife, down on the surface. I don't know what she must be going through, but I can't be stranded up here for years.” Looking up at the door, he added, “Maybe...”

   “Yes,” Larson said with a sneer. “Years, and years, and years. Enough time that everyone will have forgotten that you even exist, and your wife finds someone else to marry. Tell you what. I'll make sure you're the first to know when we hear something about it.”

   “No!” he yelled, rising to his feet, but before Larson could reach him, Morgan snatched at him with her arm, sending him tumbling to the floor. He turned, looking up at her, his eyes filled with panic.

   “Are you working with them?” Long asked.

   “She just saved your life, maggot,” Larson said, shaking his head. “The least you could do is thank her.” Deliberately pulling his pistol out of his holster, he said, “In fact, I positively insist that your thank her.”

   He looked up at her, eyes widening, then glanced from left to right, before replying, “I….”

   “Leave him alone,” Medina said. “He hasn't done anything to you.”

   “He would have, though,” Larson said, keepin
g his pistol pointed at him. “He'd have tried to kill me, put those little hands of his around my throat and squeezed the life from me. I know exactly what he would have done, what you all would do, so give me once good reason why I should show you any mercy at all.”

   Morgan lashed out with her foot, striking at Larson's wrist, catching him unawares and knocking the pistol from his hand. Moving with lightning speed, she snatched the weapon out of the air as it slowly tumbled to the ground, firing a wild shot that smashed into the wall, missing Larson's head by inches. Sirens blazed through the air, and Morgan held her pistol raised at Larson's forehead, pointing it right between his eyes.

   “You were talking about mercy, I think,” she said. “Mercy is one of those things that we all must give if we expect to receive it. Based on that, give me one good reason not to kill you where you stand.”

   “Because if you don't,” Dubois replied, stepping through the door, “I'll be forced to kill you.”

   Shaking her head, she said, “You've just saved Larson's life.” She ejected the clip, tossing it to the floor, then threw the pistol at the fuming guard, who moved forward with his fists bunched.

   “After I'm finished...”

   “That's enough,” Dubois said. “Chief, I think you should go and get something to eat yourself. Klein can take over here.”

   Larson glared at him, and said, “Don't assume you call all the shots here, Lieutenant. We're a long way from any senior authority, and most of the people here are a lot more loyal to me than to you.” He looked at Morgan, adding, “There will be a time, Ensign, and a place, and we will finish what we have started here today. You can count on it.” Leering at her, he said, “Once the deadline is up, I'd be happy to give you an escort to the airlock myself.”

   “Chief...”

   “Yes, sir,” Larson sneered, shaking his head as he walked through the door, locking a vicious stare at Morgan the whole time. Medina looked at Morgan with disbelief, while the rest of the prisoners stared at her in outright admiration.