First Principles: Samair in Argos: Book 3

by KOTCHER, MICHAEL

  Tamara nodded, gritting her teeth. “Understood. Hopefully the Chief will be able to get the structural integrity up so that we can catch them with some time to spare.”

  Vincent Eamonn was seated at his usual chair in the wardroom aboard his ship, the bulk freighter Grania Estelle with a cup of coffee on the table before him. He was reading over the report from his chief of security, the wolf woman Saiphirelle.

  My team is on the station now, Captain. We’ve secured Operations and Environmental. We’ve policed up those of the invader force that are still alive, there were fifteen, all told, all but three of them wounded. I’ve also managed to capture the leader, a Glacis Ghovorak. He was more than willing to surrender, so we stripped his clothes, weapons, and all the rest, gave him a prison jumpsuit and tossed him into a cell down in the brig. I’ve got the rest of his people in the brig.

  My second group is on the Kara. There was no problem securing the ship, even less so than the station. There was no resistance and George Miller was easily able to get to the bridge and assume control. He isn’t happy with the control stations, apparently the fixes that the locals did to get the ship up and running were slipshod at best, worse than before we fixed her up back a few months ago. The small prize crew we have aboard seems to have things well in hand and my security teams have locked the crew in one of the cargo bays. The bays have been retrofitted into living quarters and we made sure that there were no active consoles, weapons or anything else that they would be able to make mischief. I also made sure to have my team inform the crew that if they misbehave, I’ll have the atmo pumped down out of the room until they pass out. Whether we turn the air back on depends on your mood.

  Vincent found himself chuckling at that. He’d given Saiphirelle orders to pacify the ship and the station, but he didn’t want a bloodbath. There’d been far too much killing already and with Samair and her ships duking it out with the battlecruiser, there was certainly going to be even more today. Turan and his people were over on the station, assisting with all of the casualties, which included the station’s chief of security, and Saiphirelle’s sister, Corajen Nymeria, who had been critically wounded in the fighting. A few were being stabilized and transferred back to the Grania Estelle’s sickbay. The medical contingent aboard the station was good sized, but they simply couldn’t handle the load. Those who were too injured to move too far, like Chief Corajen, were brought to the station sickbay to be treated. Turan himself had taken over the surgery for Chief Nymeria himself. He trusted no one else to handle it. She was in good hands, Vincent knew.

  Which left the problem of the Kara. Tamara had probably done the right thing in seizing the ship, citing grounds that the Kara had lugged the mercenaries over from the planet and dropped them off at the station. Hell, now that the Kara was in his hands, they could reconfigure it again but this time to carry cargo. A ship that size, with about a third of the cargo capacity of the Grania Estelle would be invaluable in increasing trade in the nearby region.

  The problem was the ship itself. The government was scream bloody murder that FP had seized possession of Seylonique property. Most likely the word “unprovoked” would be thrown around, and FP would be crucified in the local press. Grania Estelle had sensor recordings, undoubtedly Cavalier had some too. Vincent would have to check with the Kutok mining station to see about their records, but he had little doubt they’d have some record of armed boarding parties coming aboard the station from the Kara. But Vincent doubted anyone outside of the company would care about the facts, or even evidence. All they would see, and the government would see to that, was that an evil corporation run by outsiders had stolen government property, killed Seylonique citizens and then shot up the Leytonstone. Hopefully that last would show Tamara and her fellows victorious over the battlecruiser, but either way, it would look bad for FP. He probably would have to give the ship back, but he would make sure that he got his say in the media and that he was magnanimously returning it to the government, despite how much damaged they had cost him and his company.

  “Stella?” he called out to the empty room.

  The holo projector over the table lit up and the image of a teenage girl, wearing a shipsuit with dark hair pulled back appeared, as though she was standing on the table. She had purple stripes on her cheeks and a trio of red streaks in her hair, which went straight back from the hairline at her forehead all the way back to the tips of her ponytail. “Yes, Captain?” the AI asked.

  “Have Serinda get a message to the Samarkand,” he said, referring to FP’s constructor ship, which was a few light minutes away, digging around in the asteroid belt. “If they’re not already aware of what’s going on, give them the full update. Inform them that we’ll be in touch in a few hours, but for now maintain operations.”

  “Understood, sir.” She nodded.

  “Any updates on the fight going on with the Leytonstone?”

  Stella nodded, her face grim. “The fight continues. From what my long range sensors have picked up, Tamara and her ships have been harassing the battlecruiser.” She paused. “That’s odd.”

  “What?”

  “The Leytonstone is accelerating toward us. And it looks like the fighters are staying with her, continuing to harass, but the corvette has broken contact.”

  Vincent felt his spine go cold. “Destroyed?”

  She shook her head. “No, Captain, not as far as I can tell. We’re too far out for me to get a clear reading, but I’m still reading the Cavalier’s beacon ID and power signature.”

  He sighed in relief. “Well, that’s something. But you said the Leytonstone is coming here?”

  “Well, they were anyway,” she pointed out.

  “Yeah, but we can’t stop her. Hell, it was iffy whether Tamara’s forces would be able to stop that ship.”

  Stella nodded. “Statistically only about a twenty-seven percent chance of success, pitting a corvette and twenty-six fighters against a damaged battlecruiser.”

  Vincent snorted. “Not great odds, Stella. And that’s it? Twenty-seven percent? We don’t even know the status of the battlecruiser.”

  She shrugged. “I could go into the facts that we do know, Captain. All the data that I’ve collected from the orbital’s datanet and from the rumors I’ve pieced together, as well as other information I’ve gotten from the Kara’s databanks. I don’t know how interested in all if it you’d be. Suffice it to say, though, while the Leytonstone certainly won’t be up to full combat capability, it’ll certainly be dangerous.”

  He sighed. “But twenty-seven percent, Stella? That’s just insulting.”

  The AI laughed. “Perhaps. Maybe Korqath and Tamara can pull it out of the fire. It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  Vincent gave a small smile in return. “I hope so. Is there anything we can do to help?”

  Stella sighed, a very human gesture, something she didn’t need to do since she wasn’t organic and didn’t need air to breathe. “Not that I can see, Captain. I mean, we have a few more days before enough of the fighters we’re building are ready. We have four on the deck right now going through final checks, but it would be another day before those are ready. But we also don’t have any pilots for them.”

  He sighed again. “I guess that’s out. And I’m not going to bring the big girl,” he patted the table, “into battle. I’m seriously considering leaving this area and heading over to the Samarkand.”

  Stella frowned, steepling her fingers. “Well, I can’t argue with your thought about keeping me out of the line of fire, but what about all the people? The FP employees, the security teams and the crew off this ship on the Kara and the Kutok mine? We can’t leave them.”

  “I have no intention of leaving them,” Vincent told her. “I’m just wondering what we can do. This ship certainly can’t stand up to the battlecruiser, with what few weapons we even have.”

  Stella shook her head. “No way. I swore I wouldn’t go riding against death ever again. Once was enough.”

  �
�You can say that again. I’m a freighter captain, a businessman,” he said, leaning back in his chair. “We’ve been making a living, such as it is, for years, plying the spacelanes. We’ve dealt with the odd scrap or two, but the Argos Cluster has gotten far more dangerous, hell just in the last year. And look where we are now. A supposedly safe star system being attacked by the locals because they don’t like how I do business.” He laced his fingers behind his head and looked up at the overhead. He pursed his lips. “Where’s Quesh, or Ka’Xarian?”

  Stella blinked. “Quesh is in Main Engineering,” she reported. “He’s on shift right now. Xar is down in Cargo bay eight, working on the fighters.”

  He sat up, pulling out his communicator and flipping it open. “Xar, it’s the Captain.”

  A moment’s pause. “What can I do for you, Captain? We’re busting our humps getting the new fighters done. And may I say, they are beautiful.”

  He chuckled. “I’m sure they are, Xar, but that’s not why I’m calling.”

  The captain could hear the zheen moving away from some loud noises. “I’ll be right back. Yeah, Captain’s on the line. Just keep your comments to yourself. I told you I’ll be right back!” He was yelling to someone in the background that Vincent couldn’t hear. “Sorry about that Captain,” Ka’Xarian said, as the ambient noise level in the background dropped dramatically. “Moved out into the corridor. So what can I help you with?”

  “Well, I’d love to get those fighters finished up and launched, but as Stella pointed out, even if they were ready to fly, we don’t have any pilots for them.”

  The zheen buzzed. “No, Captain, we don’t.”

  “But apparently the battle is coming our way and Tamara and her forces might not be able to stop it. We need to do something to help.”

  A pause. “Well, Grania Estelle can’t fight the Leytonstone. They’ll wipe the floor with us without even slowing down.”

  “That’s what I was thinking,” Vincent concurred. “But we need something. Even something small.”

  “Well…” the zheen said slowly. “What about the shuttles?”

  “What about them?”

  “Give me a few minutes. Cap, can you come down to the boat bay?”

  “Sure,” he said. “I have some time before the Leytonstone gets here.”

  “See you there.”

  The comm clicked off. Vincent met Stella’s gaze. “Any idea what he’s up to?” he asked, getting up from the table.

  She smiled. “Knowing him, it’ll be inventive and you won’t like it, but it might just work.”

  He chuckled, heading for the hatch. “You’re right, I probably won’t like it. But if it works, I’ll forgo the vicious tongue lashing he’ll probably deserve.”

  When Vincent arrived in the boat bay, Ka’Xarian was already there, steering a hover pallet that contained a one hundred liter drum of helium 3 and a squat, boxy device. He looked up from what he was doing as the captain walked in. “Captain, good. I have your solution here.” He gestured to the hover pallet.

  “A drum of helium 3?” Vincent asked.

  “That’s just the fuel source,” the engineer replied. “This item here,” he said, patting the device, “is the real solution.”

  The captain grimaced. “Xar, it’s been a long day that isn’t over yet. Let’s pretend I’m just a starship captain and you’re one of my Assistant Chief Engineers. Explain to me why this is the solution.”

  Xar chittered a laugh. “Yes, Captain. This here is a detonator. I’ve had my team working on it since we got back from Heb.”

  “A detonator? Which means what, Xar?”

  “Well, with the proper fuel source,” he patted the drum of helium 3, “it would be a helium 3 fusion bomb.”

  The captain froze. “You built a bomb on my ship?”

  “I built a bomb with no explosive,” the zheen replied, sounding a bit defensive. “It’s perfectly safe. I wasn’t going to endanger anyone on the ship, Captain.”

  “You sure could have fooled me, Xar,” the captain fumed. “What the hell is this doing on my ship?”

  “Well,” the zheen hesitated. “I built it to assist in the mining operations. Use it to crack some really big asteroids.”

  Vincent realized that his jaw was hanging open and he closed his mouth with a click. But then he frowned. “How did you build this? I know for a fact that the replicators won’t build bombs. Not without Samair’s authorization codes which I know she wouldn’t have given.”

  The zheen nodded. “Yes, Captain, you’re correct. I didn’t get this out of a replicator. Or rather, I didn’t get all of the parts from there. I did replicate a few of the parts and then just machined and assembled the rest by hand. My team and I build six of these babies. And they’re ready for deployment, just add fuel.”

  Vincent closed his eyes and took a long, deep breath. “In the future, Assistant Chief Engineer Ka’Xarian, you will keep me informed of all dangerous materials you are working with on my ship. If you fail to inform me and I find out, you will no longer be working on my ship. Is that understood? I will drop you off on the nearest oxygen world we come to and you will not be coming back.”

  Xar’s antennae drooped. “Yes, Captain. Sorry, Captain.”

  Vincent scowled at him for another long moment. “Good. Now, talk to me about these devices. What’s the yield?”

  “Dialable,” Xar replied. “From as low as five megatons to as high as fifty. Clean explosion, fusion bomb. No residual radiation.”

  “So we’ve got six high explosives, but no launchers. What did you want to do with them?”

  “Well,” Ka’Xarian said, his antennae waving. “I was thinking one of two things. We load three of these each into two of our shuttles. We hook up some sort of receiver so that Stella can fly them by remote and launch them toward the Leytonstone. Stella does some evasive maneuvers to keep them from getting shot down and then plows them into the battlecruiser.” He clapped his hands together. “Boom!”

  “How long?” Vincent asked.

  “Twenty minutes to load and arm the devices,” Xar replied. “And then another twenty or so to get the receivers in. We’ve got a few sitting on the deck in Cargo bay eight from the maintenance bots we were stockpiling which should work.”

  “All right,” he said with a sigh. “I hate to lose the shuttles, but anything we can do to save the ship…” He nodded. “All right, pull the team off of fighter construction duty and get to work on this. If Quesh asks, tell him I told you to do it. And Xar?”

  “Yes, Captain?” the engineer asked, turning his head to face his commander.

  “Get everything loaded, but don’t start arming bombs in my boat bay until the last minute, please. My ship is starting to run smoothly again. I’d like to keep it that way.”

  Ka’Xarian nodded. “Of course, Captain. As one of the ones who is doing the work, I completely agree to that.”

  “All right, Captain,” Fayyad al Fakhir said over the comms, thirty-five minutes later. “The braces are in place and locked down. For a temporary fix, the ship is ready for high speed maneuvering. I recommend you don’t push higher than eighty-five percent power, but otherwise this girl is ready to dance.”

  Tamara smiled. “Very well done, Chief. Thank you. Keep me informed if anything changes.” The comm clicked off. “All right, helm, you heard the man. Increase speed. We’ve got to catch up to the Leytonstone before she gets too close to the Kutok mine.”

  “Can’t let the starfighters have all the fun, ma’am,” Garidhak pointed out, which caused some chuckles around the bridge.

  Tamara was among them. “True enough, Guns. Just make sure you’re ready to engage as soon as we’re close enough.” She watched the display as the acceleration increased and saw the Time to Intercept indicator get cut from twenty-five minutes to twelve. Twelve minutes to fight against a battlecruiser, one that we haven’t appreciably damaged yet. In a ship that has already taken some serious battering. Stars, please give us the fortit
ude to see this through.

  The Cavalier raced ahead, the sparrow chasing down the tiger.

  Chapter 2

  “One minute to weapons range, Captain,” Garidhak said. “I’ve got their engines in my sights.”

  “Once we’re in range, unload with all available weapons, Guns,” Tamara ordered. “We won’t get many chances with this.”

  “Understood.” The Severite focused intently on her controls and her displays.

  Tamara nodded slowly, her own eyes on displays. The timer was running down for the time until the Cavalier would intercept. Thankfully, the race to catch the larger ship put the Cavalier right in the Leytonstone’s stern, which gave her a beautiful shot right at their engines. And she was going to make sure that Garidhak blasted them to hell and gone. A disabled battlecruiser would be much easier to deal with than one that could still maneuver. Of course, the problem with a disabled battlecruiser was that while her engines would be down, it didn’t arrest her momentum. She’d continue barreling forward, barely able to alter vector using only maneuvering thrusters. And on her current vector, she was headed straight for the Kutok mine. Of course, following that thought to its logical conclusion, the ship would head straight into the mine and then straight into the atmosphere of the gas giant beyond. It would be in the crew’s best interest to surrender so that FP tugs could latch on and pull her clear. Maneuvering thrusters alone wouldn’t provide enough thrust to change the battlecruiser’s vector to avoid the planet unless they started firing now. And they wouldn’t.

  “In range!” Garidhak crowed from tactical.

  “Fire!” Tamara barked.

  The remaining heavy laser cannons spat fire and missiles belched from the starboard tubes, arcing around to vector in on the battlecruiser’s exposed stern. Explosions rippled across the after section, and two of the remaining propulsion units were shredded, leaving only one left functioning.