This was stupid. First of all, Carvalho agreed with him. They had five falcons, and a man suffered a bad concussion about one jump in ten. There was a strong chance at least one of them would end up drifting for some indeterminate period of time, unable to take the controls. A falcon’s advantage was its acceleration and maneuverability. Its ability to evade hostile fire and take the fight to the enemy’s front door. Drifting about, you’d be easily killed or captured.
“Time is up,” he said. “Strap yourselves in or go check yourself into sick bay and tell the doc that you’ve got a bad case of battle jitters.”
More grumbling, but they did as they were told. Mechanics popped the canopies and helped the pilots into their strikers, then scanned the exteriors before withdrawing. A faint buzz indicated that the rails were live, and Carvalho’s console confirmed. He flipped switches and tapped at the screen to run his own checks.
He glanced through the canopy and caught Greeves eyeing him. She mouthed something, but he didn’t catch it. When he flipped the com, she wasn’t there, and had looked away.
Carvalho had a bad feeling. They’d spent several hours a day strapped into the cockpit over the past couple of weeks, running simulations. But only four or five real launches, and things were different in space. A falcon had an inertia engine to keep you from splattering against the inside of your cockpit, but you could feel the shifts, the press of acceleration, as antigrav struggled to keep you intact on the sharpest turns. And no live fire drills to complete training. Throw in the bickering that had come from lack of a wing commander until now, and well, you had five men and women who were liable to piss themselves the first time they saw an enemy ship.
A computerized female voice sounded in his ear. “Forty-five seconds to jump. Strap into place in preparation.”
Carvalho’s striker glided forward on the rail. A bombproof opened, and he slid into an airlock about three inches wider than his ship. The door slid closed behind him. A narrow, claustrophobic feeling wrapped its bands around his chest.
“Thirty seconds to jump,” the computer said. “Prepare for disorienting effects.”
The old Blackbeard crew had started calling the computer Jane, in honor of their former ship’s AI, a name which quickly spread to the rest of Void Queen. But Carvalho thought this version of Jane sounded colder, less friendly. Capp insisted it was the same voice and it was all in his head. He wasn’t so sure. This Jane sounded hectoring. Like a cranky aunt who tells you to tuck in your shirttails, then purses her lips when you don’t move quickly enough.
Greeves came on the com. “I heard you just now, but couldn’t get my com connected. I said sorry. Shouldn’t have taken Judkins’s side just now.”
“Forget it. You were right. But I do not see as we have a choice. These are our orders.” It all sounded stiff coming out of his mouth.
“Just want you to know I’m all business now. Give orders and I’ll follow. The others, too. Even Judkins.”
“Right.”
“Pretend you know what you’re doing. That’s the key.”
“That is what they always say,” Carvalho said. “I will do as much pretending as I can.”
“Ten seconds to launch,” Jane said sternly. A long pause. “Five, four, three . . .”
#
Carvalho woke up disoriented, spinning. For a moment he thought he was on San Pablo, at the amusement park down by the river where his father used to take him as a boy. There was a ride called los tornillos—the screws. It sent you spinning around in a giant corkscrew-like motion. Once, he’d eaten too much sugared fry bread and threw up mid-ride. A wide arc of vomit had twisted out of his mouth and sprayed the riders of the adjacent car.
He fought down the nausea, thankful he hadn’t eaten any fry bread this time. Only as the flashing lights drew his attention, and the stars on the viewscreen reminded him that he was in space, did it gradually come back to him where he was. He had no memory of the jump, no memory of the rail hurling the striker into space. There was chatter on the general com, but it sounded muddled, like it was in a strange language.
First he had to move the blasted falcon, get out of the helpless sprawling position that he’d taken after launch. Then assess the situation. He grabbed for the stick and pressed the throttle. The engine flared to life, and he swept into motion.
The chatter on the com started to resolve into individual words and phrases.
“Keep them off! There are . . . boarders.”
“. . . those bloody falcons. Give them . . .”
The voices were alarmed, panicked. And the viewscreen confirmed what Carvalho was already sensing. Void Queen was under attack.
A warship loomed on either side of Void Queen. They were long and gray, flat on top, with sharp, menacing snouts. The ships exposed an array of guns both above and below, with missile bays on their deck-like tops. Each was about the size of HMS Peerless. Not as big as an Ironside-class battle cruiser like Void Queen, but big enough.
The pair charged Void Queen with cannon blazing. Kinetic fire hammered her rear shields. They were trying to knock out the engines. And since the larger ship was not yet returning fire, it was only a matter of time before its heavy shields burst apart under the attack.
Carvalho called his companions. “This is Falcon One. Report.”
“Falcon Three reporting.” That was Judkins. He didn’t sound surly anymore, he sounded terrified. “Give me orders!”
“Falcon Four.” That was Stephenson.
Where were two and five? “Greeves, where are you? Bailes?” No answer.
He scanned his surroundings. There they were, a few miles distant, drifting slowly away from Void Queen toward one of the enemy ships. Its guns kept a steady, pulsing fire at Void Queen, but any moment it would notice the two small falcons. They’d be easy target practice for a deck gun.
As for Carvalho’s other two pilots, they must have come to before he did, because they’d already caught up to him and were decelerating to match his speed as they fell beside him on either flank. He was unclear what to do, torn between the need to attack the enemy ship to win Void Queen breathing space and the need to shield the two helpless falcons.
“Carvalho,” a voice said groggily. “Where are you?” It was Bailes, thank God. He sounded rough, like a man suffering a bad hangover.
“This is Falcon One. Look out, you’re up in the enemy’s face.”
Bailes must have caught a glimpse of his surroundings, because he let out a string of curses that continued as his engine flared to life. He blasted in a straight line at first, which took him directly toward the enemy warship. The ship spotted him at the last minute and let off a burst of fire. Bailes got his falcon under control and veered away, unharmed.
“King’s balls, that was close,” Bailes said. “What the hell are these things? Star wolves?”
“Looks that way. Get yourself back here.”
“What about Greeves? She’s just sitting there, she’s gonna—”
“You let me worry about that,” Carvalho said. “Fall into formation. I need your guns.”
Unfortunately, Bailes’s flight had left the star wolf aware of their presence. As he swept in to join the other three falcons, the enemy deck gun turned on them and fired, forcing them to scatter. By the time they regrouped, the wolf was moving toward them. It seemed to spot Greeves’s falcon, and moved to intercept.
“Greeves!” Carvalho said. “Wake up!”
Her falcon lay nose down in relation to the sky wolf. Guns inactive, engine cold. Drifting like a ghost ship, as if Greeves had simply died.
“Greeves!”
“Missiles launched,” Judkins warned.
Carvalho’s stomach lurched. At this range, they’d blast Greeves out of the sky in seconds. But a glance at the console corrected his misconception. The sky wolf hadn’t fired its missiles, that was Void Queen. Vargus’s gunnery was finally alert, and a volley of missiles sprayed over the battlefield. Someone on the bridge must have noticed
the predicament of the striker wing, because the missiles came racing toward the star wolf closing in on the helpless falcon, ready to gobble it up. Carvalho’s four ships were close enough to give support, and fired their pulse cannon in a concentrated barrage.
It was too late. The Scandian warship would reach Greeves before the support fire. The unconscious pilot was on her own.
Chapter Twelve
Catarina had jumped dozens of times, maybe hundreds. She’d suffered the occasional concussion, but had never fallen to a full-blown case of the trips. Indeed, she prided herself on being the first on any bridge to regain control of her faculties. That had continued with the first two jumps on board Void Queen, and this jump was no exception.
Unfortunately, her crew was harder hit. Nyb Pim came around first, but he couldn’t get his course sent to the engine room, which was struggling. Capp emerged next, a mouthful of curse words at her disposal. Finally, the tech officers and defense grid specialists. Even before the two star wolves hit them with pummel guns, the officers were on the com, shouting orders, getting people throughout the ship to their stations. Clarifying old orders and issuing new ones to reflect the rapidly deteriorating situation.
The computer AI was already chiming in with warnings. “Aft shield damage taken. Number two shield at eighty-two percent strength. Deck shield ninety-four percent.”
Catarina could live with that. But with a star wolf battering her from either side, it wouldn’t be long until those shield warnings on her console changed from yellow to blinking red.
“Dammit, why aren’t we returning fire?”
“Got the gunnery on the line,” Capp said. “Barker says the missiles will be up in a sec.”
“Missiles won’t chase them off. I need torpedoes.”
“Aye, Cap’n.” The first mate turned back to her conversation over the com, relaying the captain’s orders, but with a good deal more shouting and cursing.
Even while the gunnery was coming online, Catarina sent an emergency subspace back to McGowan. Quit screwing around and get those ships in here, or she’d join the blasted Scandians and attack his fleet herself. The language was slightly more polite than that, but not much.
“We got missiles,” Capp said. “Torpedoes coming. Barker wants a target.”
A star wolf was closing in on Carvalho’s striker wing. One of the falcons was still down, the pilot nonresponsive. The other four had charged in with pulse cannons firing, but the star wolf attacking from Void Queen’s port side drove them off with a heavy burst from its deck gun. It could easily destroy the remaining striker, but seemed eager to capture it.
It crossed Catarina’s mind that she could sacrifice the falcon and gain valuable time. Let Carvalho harass the wolf while it hauled the small ship in, and she could hammer the star wolf attacking her starboard. She’d lose a falcon, but maybe survive the battle. No. That wasn’t why she’d launched the striker wing. It was not simply a diversion.
“Launch a barrage. Target the wolf off port.”
Missiles raced away from the battle cruiser. They hooked over and under Carvalho’s falcons. The star wolf fired bursts that took out the first three missiles. The fourth nearly got through, but a targeting laser hit the engine, and the missile spiraled away and detonated at a safe distance. The star wolf seemed to hesitate, then continued toward the drifting falcon.
“We have torpedoes,” Capp said. Seconds later, she added, “And the main battery.”
Catarina swiped her hand across the screen to show the torpedo arrays, not yet able to remember the exact configuration by memory. She examined the tubes holding Hunter-IIs, which contained less explosive punch than the Mark-IVs, but had better survivability and better enemy pursuit.
“Give me tubes three, four, and six. Starboard enemy!”
“Starboard?” Capp asked, voice pinched with worry.
“If we don’t keep it at bay, we’ll never get to the falcons in time.”
“Aye, Cap’n.”
“And warn the falcons about incoming fire. It’s their turn next.”
Even as the torpedoes lumbered from their tubes and accelerated toward the star wolf on her starboard, she ordered the gunnery to roll and present the main battery in the direction of the enemy attacking her striker wing. She waited for Carvalho to get out of the way of the cannon, but he kept racing toward his stricken comrade. Nothing to be done for it now. She had to fire or her shot wouldn’t arrive before the star wolf, which sensors indicated was readying a harpoon.
“Fire at will.”
Void Queen shuddered. Thousands of tons of shot rolled out from the ship. Even as it hurtled toward the enemy, she could see that most of it was off target. Was something wrong with the defense grid computer? At last the falcons dove to evade, all except for the one that dangled helplessly before the enemy. Miraculously, none of the cannon fire hit it.
The star wolf fired countermeasures, and turned up on the z-axis. Some of the kinetic shot struck its underbelly. Too much missed. All eyes on the bridge turned to the side screen that was showing a close-up of the enemy hull. No venting gasses, no indication that the shot had penetrated the star wolf’s shields. The cannon had done its job anyway, forcing it to maneuver away from the helpless falcon.
Carvalho’s remaining four ships regrouped and charged the star wolf. Pulse fire struck the enemy’s underbelly, forcing it into another evasive maneuver. Its pummel guns turned, trying to track the falcons as they flashed by. The deck gun now took a shot at the final, immobile falcon. No more attempt to capture it alive.
Ironically, at that exact moment, the small ship made its first move. The engine glowed, and it began to turn. Not quickly enough. Enemy fire hit the engine and knocked it out. The ship went spinning away.
Meanwhile, the torpedoes Void Queen had fired at the starboard enemy ate up the distance separating her from the star wolf off starboard. The Scandians fired enemy countermeasures, but the Hunter-IIs evaded. Another burst of countermeasures. This one took out a torpedo. The final two would strike in seconds. Time to see just how good the enemy shields were.
And then one of the two remaining torpedoes simply fizzled out. Smythe called over that the enemy had destroyed the targeting system. The final Hunter-II pursued the star wolf, which kept maneuvering. A final attempt to evade, and then the torpedo slammed into shielding just above the pummel guns. It wasn’t an ideal spot, but from a burst of fire and gas, the torpedo appeared to have done some damage. The enemy ship fell back from the battlefield.
“Captain, shall we pursue?” Nyb Pim asked.
“No, Pilot. I want that port-side ship, first. Capp, get the falcons in for support. Herd the enemy toward our guns.” Catarina nodded at the defense grid station, where another Blackbeard veteran, this one the young Ladino woman, Lomelí, had been in constant contact with the gunnery. “Ready another broadside. We’ll close the range this time.”
“Careful, Cap’n,” Capp said. “We get too close, and they’ll try to board us.”
“We’ve got them on the run. They won’t board.”
Catarina wasn’t sure about that; who knew what these Scandians were thinking? Was it even logical, or had they gone into some sort of berserker rage that could not be turned off? A quick scan back to the jump point showed that she was still awaiting her reinforcements.
“Blast it, McGowan, where are you?”
Carvalho’s four falcons swept around and took up position beneath Void Queen. She’d turn about and hit the enemy with her main cannon while Carvalho prepared to either charge and force the star wolf into contact or to break off and keep the other ship at bay. The second wolf was giving signs of renewing the attack.
Smythe looked up from the tech console. “We’ve got trouble, Captain. I’ve been running scans, and there are more ships dead ahead. Look.”
He split the main viewscreen. Three dark shapes, cloaked and only semi-visible to Void Queen’s sensors, lurked in their direct path. She’d been pursuing one of the star
wolves, gradually closing in on it as it appeared to shimmy and dodge their pursuit, but it had been leading her into an ambush. That Smythe had been able to sniff them out in the midst of the chaos of battle, while simultaneously working with the defense specialists in the preparation of countermeasures, was impressive.
In truth, Catarina had worried about her tech officer these past couple of weeks. The long slogs left him fighting obvious boredom, and he often seemed half-distracted. He did his work with one hand and played his silly game with the other. But now that they were in combat, his multitasking had proven its worth.
So close, only a few more minutes and Void Queen could have overtaken the enemy ship and finished it off. But the second star wolf was holding position behind them, the one ahead was positioned for a quick turnabout to fight, and there were three more enemies lurking.
“Retreat to the jump point. Prepare torpedoes to fight off pursuit.”
The instant they changed course, the three additional star wolves dropped their cloaks and exposed guns. They fired missiles from long range, but Catarina’s crew had plenty of time to bring them down. The two star wolves she’d already fought seemed reluctant to close ranks.
“They’ve seen our teeth,” she said. “They know we can deliver a bite.”
“A fine piece of equipment,” Smythe said.
“Aye, she’s not bad,” Capp said. There was something grudging in her tone. “Course, she ain’t Blackbeard, neither.”
“You think Blackbeard could hold off two star wolves?” Smythe asked.
“We got five wolves,” Capp said, “in case you didn’t notice.”
Yes, and the way the ships were positioned, Void Queen couldn’t outrun them—and that was assuming she had better acceleration and top speed over the long haul, which was an unknown. Oh, and the simple matter of getting Catarina’s striker wing back into the hold. They were quick out of the blocks, but no good in a long chase.
With the two damaged star wolves holding back, and the three newcomers still at arm’s length, Void Queen was safe for now, but give it another hour or two, and the enemy could force a fight.
Queen of the Void (The Void Queen Trilogy Book 1) Page 11