The Oncoming Storm

by Christopher Nuttall

  “Captain,” the XO said, “the spaceport is under attack. So is Government House.”

  “Red Alert,” Kat ordered. “Pat . . . ah, Davidson. Where is he?”

  “His shuttle was heading towards the spaceport,” the XO said.

  “Recall him,” Kat snapped. Newer alerts were flashing up as the command and control system struggled to rebuild itself. The spaceport wasn’t the only place under attack. It looked as though insurgents were striking everywhere, from forward operating bases to medical centers and even economic assistance facilities. There were so many attacks that the garrison commander would be unable to decide which one was the key, which one to deal with first. “We need him back onboard.”

  She took a breath. “And try to reestablish a link to the admiral.”

  “That might be impossible,” Roach said. The tactical officer sounded worried. “Government House is under heavy attack.”

  Kat shuddered. How many locals, from street sweepers to prostitutes, had worked within the security fence? They’d had years to plan their uprising, smuggling weapons into the complex while pretending to be good little collaborators. And now, they were throwing everything they had at their hated oppressors. The admiral might already be dead. He was certainly in no position to take command of the fleet.

  “We can’t even call in orbital strikes,” the XO warned. “There’s no way to separate our forces from enemy insurgents.”

  “Recall Davidson,” Kat repeated. At least she had a full crew on her ship. God alone knew how many of the other ships had full complements. “And then try to establish links to the remainder of 7th Fleet.”

  She looked down at her hands, unsure of what to do. The entire situation was unraveling . . . and the enemy fleet hadn’t even put in an appearance. Given time, and orbital control, the Commonwealth could restore some semblance of order, but she knew the Theocracy would know it too. Their fleet would have to arrive soon . . .

  Unless they want us to slaughter the insurgents, she thought morbidly. They’re not going to leave Cadiz alone either. Better to kill off everyone who might resist first.

  “Captain,” Ross said, “I have lost contact with the Marine shuttles.”

  Kat shivered. “I’m on my way,” she said. She rose. “Keep trying to reestablish contact.”

  The high-velocity missile came out of nowhere. Davidson and his men had no time to do more than brace themselves before the missile slammed into the shuttle’s drive field, sending them tumbling down towards the ground. The pilot struggled to maintain control, somehow managing to keep the craft steady long enough to make a proper crash landing. Davidson rose to his feet as soon as the craft was down, then ran for the hatch. Outside, it was calm, suspiciously calm. But in the distance, he could see smoke rising from the direction of the spaceport.

  “I can’t make contact with anyone,” Corporal Loomis reported as the marines fanned out, weapons at the ready. Everyone was accounted for, but whoever had shot them down might be coming to finish the job. “The planetary datanet is down.”

  Davidson swallowed a curse. They’d landed in rough country, several miles from the spaceport, Gibraltar, or the PDC. If the smoke was any indicator, the spaceport was under attack—and he couldn’t see any signs of shuttles coming or going over the land. And that suggested the insurgents had the spaceport locked down. For once, he found himself unsure of what to do. What were their orders if caught in hostile territory?

  Any other world would have a large population willing to help us, he thought. But not here.

  “We need to move away from the spaceport,” he said finally. He wanted to run towards the installation and join the defenders, but the battle might well be over by the time the Marines arrived. He’d seen too much of the spaceport’s interior to have any illusions about how long it could defend itself if it came under heavy attack. There were just too many enemies within the walls. “And find somewhere to go to ground.”

  None of his troops argued. Instead, they followed him as he led the way towards the capital city. Strangers would be noticed in the countryside, he suspected. It would be better to blend in with city-dwellers as much as possible. And they would probably have to ditch their uniforms and most of their weapons at some point.

  He cursed the admiral under his breath. It would have been relatively simple to ensure the shit never hit the fan—or, at least, that the installations on the surface were secure. But Morrison had been too lazy—or criminally negligent—to care. Davidson silently promised himself that the admiral would not survive, no matter what else happened. He wouldn’t be allowed to go home and plead his case . . .

  Shaking his head, he looked towards the smoke rising from the city. It was unlikely Admiral Morrison was still alive.

  “I have a live feed from a drone near the spaceport,” Ross reported. “The installation is under heavy attack.”

  Kat nodded as the images appeared on the display. The entire complex seemed devastated; fires were burning everywhere, while a number of destroyed shuttles lay on the ground. She could see hundreds of dead bodies while a handful of men armed with makeshift weapons prowled the complex, seeking survivors. The barracks, which should have housed over two thousand soldiers, were nothing more than debris. It was clear that the defenders had been overwhelmed before they’d even known they were under attack.

  She bit her lip. “Do we have a link to Government House? Or the PDC?”

  “General Eastside seems to have taken command of the PDC,” Ross said. “But there’s no contact with Government House.”

  Kat nodded, unsurprised. The admiral was dead. Most of the senior naval officers were dead. Or, she told herself, they were out of contact. Not that it really mattered, she suspected. The spaceport was flaming debris, while insurgents prowled the countryside with surface-to-air missiles. There was no way she could send shuttles to recover the commanding officers, even if she’d had a solid lock on their positions. They’d be shot down by the insurgents.

  “Purge the communications system completely,” she ordered. It would destroy any encryption codes, but right now they were worse than useless. Kat and her crew would have to send in the clear and hope the enemy wasn’t able to intercept and read messages in time to make a difference. “And try to reestablish the datanet for 7th Fleet.”

  And then new alarms sounded, followed by red lights on the display.

  Commander Fran Higgins had never considered herself prone to despair. As a mustang, she had known her promotion prospects were limited compared to officers who had followed the proper command track, but she had also believed her competence would see her through. But Cadiz had sapped her determination even before the shit had finally hit the fan. If she hadn’t had the bare bones of a plan—and taken steps to prepare Defiant for operations—she might well have given up completely.

  She sat on the bridge, in the captain’s chair, trying to pull some sense out of the distorted reports from the planet’s surface. Some of them were obvious nonsense, others far too optimistic to be believed easily. But she knew the worst when she finally saw the live feed from the spaceport. The occupation was doomed.

  “The captain is dead,” she said, flatly. A third of the crew was still down on the surface—if they weren’t dead themselves—but at least she’d managed to keep the more competent officers and crew on the ship. “I want full operational power as soon as possible.”

  “We’re working on it,” Chief Engineer Ryan said. Thank God he was competent. There were at least two engineers attached to the fleet who had to have politically powerful relatives, or they would never have been promoted. “But it will take at least ten minutes to bring the ship to full power.”

  Fran cursed loudly enough to shock several of the younger officers. “Keep working on it,” she snapped. There was nothing else she could do. “And . . .”

  New icons flared into life on the display. “Vortexes,” Lieutenant Robbins shouted. She sounded as though she was on the verge of panic. “Multipl
e vortexes.”

  “Divert all power to weapons, shields, and drives,” Fran ordered. The enemy fleet had arrived—and the mighty superdreadnought and the rest of her squadron were practically sitting ducks. They could do without life support long enough to escape—or they’d be dead anyway. “And stand by point defense.”

  She gritted her teeth. The enemy ships were already launching gunboats. And 7th Fleet’s gunboat crews were in disarray. It was unlikely many of them could launch in time to make a difference. The fleet was thoroughly screwed.

  And there was still no word from the admiral.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  “Report,” Admiral Junayd ordered.

  “The infidel fleet is in disarray,” the sensor officer reported. “They’re trying to power up their drives and weapons, but they’re at a very low state of readiness.”

  “God is with us,” the cleric said.

  Admiral Junayd ignored him. “Launch gunboats,” he ordered. The infidels could not be allowed more time to prepare. One icon sparkled on the display and he glowered at it. The spying battle cruiser had made it back to Cadiz, too late. They’d already lost the StarCom, ensuring they couldn’t send an alert to the remainder of the Commonwealth. “Targets are the capital ships. They are not to leave this system alive.”

  He paused, significantly. “The battle line will advance,” he added. “The troopships and their escorts will remain behind, ready to escape back into hyperspace if necessary.”

  The cleric turned to face him. “Admiral,” he said, “must I remind you of the importance of bringing Cadiz into the fold?”

  “We cannot land troops until we have defeated the enemy fleet,” Junayd pointed out. It was important to establish a strong presence on Cadiz, if only to hunt down the surviving Commonwealth personnel, but he was keen to keep the Janissaries and the Inquisitors away from Cadiz as long as possible. A few days under their rule and the locals would start rebelling again. “And besides, I don’t care to offer the enemy a clear shot at annihilating the troops before they hit the ground.”

  He settled back, contemplating the task before him. His superdreadnoughts would finish the job of blowing their way through the Commonwealth’s defenses and obliterating their fleet. The balance of power would swing decisively in the Theocracy’s favor within an hour.

  “And transmit the formal summons to surrender,” he added. “We must invite them to submit to us.”

  It would be good if they did surrender, he knew, even though he would be cheated of a battle. But he wasn’t expecting a surrender. The Commonwealth was no isolated single-star system, unable to police space outside its atmosphere. They had space they could trade for time and powerful fleets in reserve. It was possible they would despair so completely they wouldn’t realize they could fall back, but he wasn’t counting on it. They had had too much time to think since their spy ship had returned home.

  “And send a general signal to the fleet,” he concluded. “Today we fight for victory.”

  Kat watched as countless vortexes opened and dispersed nemeses. Twenty-seven superdreadnoughts, forty-two smaller craft, and over five hundred gunboats, launching now from their carriers. The tiny vessels carried one hell of a sting, she knew, and a handful of them could take down a superdreadnought. The gunboat pilots of the 7th Fleet were still dawdling. It would be too late by the time they joined the fray.

  “Picking up a message,” Ross said. “They’re beaming it all over the system.”

  “Put it through,” Kat ordered.

  The voice was strongly accented, although Kat couldn’t place it. “Infidels, the hour of judgment is at hand,” he said. “Accept your fate, surrender your ships, and join us in worship of the One True God, or die at our hands and be plunged into the bitterest hell. You have ten minutes to comply.”

  Kat glanced at the display. Ten minutes . . . just long enough for the superdreadnoughts to enter firing range. The gunboats would be on the fleet in two minutes, unless the fleet surrendered beforehand. But that was not going to happen. The officers who might have surrendered had died on Cadiz.

  Outsmarted yourself, didn’t you? she thought, with a moment of bitter amusement. Your plan worked too well.

  But she knew it was unlikely to matter.

  She looked at the XO. “Do we have any ID on the senior surviving officer?”

  “I can’t find anyone higher than a commander,” the XO said. He sounded shocked. It was easy to believe, now, that Admiral Morrison had been an enemy agent all along. “The fleet is completely headless.”

  Kat drew in a breath. “Open a channel to the entire fleet,” she ordered. She waited for Ross’s nod, then continued. “This is Captain Kat Falcone. I am taking command of the fleet.”

  She pressed on before anyone could challenge her. Technically, she outranked everyone else confirmed to be alive, but they would know how little experience she had. And she wasn’t part of 7th Fleet’s command network. Someone might well challenge her on those grounds alone.

  But, not entirely to her surprise, no one raised a challenge. They were all too focused on staying alive.

  “Route the tactical fleet command net through Lightning,” she ordered, cursing the designers under her breath. Lightning just wasn’t designed for fleet command. If the designers hadn’t been so fixated on winning the contracts for a whole new generation of command-capable heavy cruisers . . . she shook her head bitterly. It was water under the bridge now. “And get me a full status update.”

  She took a breath. At least some of the gunboats were finally getting out into open space. It was clear the pilots were disoriented and their flight rosters had been shot to hell, but they were out in space. She issued orders to the gunboats to engage the enemy gunboats before they attacked the fleet, then weighed the situation as best as she could. No matter how she played it in her mind, she saw nothing but defeat if they held their position and tried to fight. The enemy fleet had them firmly under their guns.

  None of the reports sounded promising either. Her best superdreadnoughts required at least two weeks in the yards before they could be considered combat capable, even though the crews were doing their best to bring the ships to battle stations. Many of the smaller ships were in better condition—the rot hadn’t set in so badly—but they didn’t have the firepower to take on the Theocracy.

  “We will cover the superdreadnoughts until they are ready to escape,” she ordered. The Theocracy would go for the superdreadnoughts first, just to take them out before they could be brought back to full readiness. It would be quicker to repair any ships that escaped than build new hulls from scratch. “And as soon as they are ready to go, we will beat a hasty retreat.”

  She felt several of her officers glancing at her back in disbelief. The Royal Navy didn’t run . . . but the Royal Navy had never faced a serious challenge before. They had never been involved in the Breakaway Wars. The only real opponent had been pirates, and none of them had posed more than a brief challenge to their might. And if 7th Fleet had been worked up and ready to go, they might have given the Theocracy a bloody nose. But she knew all they could do was run.

  The Board of Inquiry might blame me for running, she thought, as the enemy gunboats raced closer. But they won’t blame anyone else.

  “The planetary defense network is still crippled,” the XO said, “but some of the automated platforms have been isolated from the communications net and are responding to orders.”

  “Target them on the gunboats,” Kat ordered. She braced herself. “And stand by point defense.”

  She watched grimly as the gunboats slashed into engagement range, evading with consummate skill as the superdreadnoughts opened fire with point defense. No gunboat could stand up to a single blast, but they were incredibly hard to hit. She had to admire the professionalism shown by the enemy pilots as they closed in on their targets, then opened fire with shipkiller missiles. Armed with antimatter, they would be devastating against shielded and unshielded targets alike.r />
  “Antimatter detonations,” Roach reported as four of the missiles were picked off by point defense. “They’re not holding back, Captain.”

  Kat nodded. The gunboats had scored five direct hits on one superdreadnought, blowing the massive vessel out of formation. For a long moment, it looked as though Hammer of Thor had survived, then the starship vanished inside a massive fireball. Kat fought down despair as the gunboats raced away from the destroyed ship, then reformed and angled back towards their next target. The point defense crews continued firing, trying to pick off the gunboats before they could enter engagement range again. But it seemed a waste of effort.

  “Message to superdreadnoughts,” Kat ordered. Safety regulations warned against it, but she was so far past caring that it hardly mattered. “They are to launch shipkillers on dispersal mode.”

  “Aye, Captain,” the XO said. He seemed to have fallen into the role of her operations officer, even though he should have taken command of the cruiser while she commanded the entire fleet. But there was no time to switch roles. “But that will damage our datanet.”

  Kat shrugged. “What datanet?”

  “Direct hit, starboard hull,” the tactical officer snapped. “Shields held, but barely.”

  Fran nodded. Defiant had been lucky. Four of the gunboats assigned to her had been picked off before they could launch their missiles, detonating the antimatter in their warheads and wiping out several of their comrades. Only one missile had struck her shields. Fran was grimly aware that the starship’s shields were held together by spit and baling wire.

  She glanced at the order from Lightning, then smiled. “Launch shipkillers on dispersal mode,” she ordered. “Target clumps of enemy ships and fire!”

  She smirked as the superdreadnought launched a spread of antimatter-armed missiles aimed at the gunboat formation. There was no hope of actually scoring a hit, but it didn’t matter. The warheads detonated as soon as they were within range, the giant explosions wiping out dozens of gunboats and disabling several others. It wasn’t a viable tactic in the long run, but it would buy them some time. But would it be enough?