First Principles: Samair in Argos: Book 3

by KOTCHER, MICHAEL

  Leicasitaj nodded, pleased at the speed that his crew had managed to get to stations. “Very well. Go ahead, XO.”

  The man nodded, pressing a control on his datapad. “Captain, we’re reading a pair of ships approaching, on a vector of one-one-six,” the zheen sitting at the sensor station reported, sounding nervous but still calm.

  “What kind of ships?” Dietrich demanded, getting into the role.

  The zheen chittered to himself. “I don’t recognize the make and model, Commander Dietrich, but they’re corvette class. Coming in at a right good clip too. Speed four-fifty.”

  “Open a channel to the freighters,” Leicasitaj ordered. “Put it to my chair.” The young Severite at the communications console pressed a few controls, then turned and nodded to his captain. The display activated showing Vincent Eamonn on one side of the screen and the older, grizzled captain of the Silver Dawn on the other. “Gentlemen, we are detecting a pair of corvette warships moving in on what we believe to be an attack vector. Mondragon will move to engage them and try and keep them off your backs. Continue on ahead, but accelerate as best you can, alter vector to thirty degrees port, down twenty. I want you to try and put some distance between your ships and theirs.”

  “Should I launch my fighters?” Vincent asked, sounding worried.

  Leicasitaj nodded. “Yes, Captain, but keep them in close. They’ll need to provide close in support for your ships. Stick together.”

  “But, Captain Leicasitaj, we’re not showing anything on sensors-…” Eamonn tried to interject.

  “Go, Captain,” the Romigani ordered, putting a note of urgency in his voice. “Mondragon will do what we can. Out.” He cut the connection as both men looked as though they were going to argue. “Nav, set course to engage those two ships,” he ordered. “Helm, engage as soon as you have course, flank speed.”

  “Intercept course,” the navigator confirmed.

  “Engage at flank, aye, sir,” the pilot replied.

  Vincent watched as the escort frigate tore off in the direction of… well, nothing. Grania Estelle’s sensors were focused on that spot, but they were picking up nothing. No ships, no threat. “Isis, alter course,” Vincent ordered. “Put us on the vector we got from our escort. Bring us up to max accel.”

  “Captain, I’ve been doing continuous sensor sweeps,” George reported. “I’m not seeing a stars-damned thing on the vector Captain Leicasitaj was looking at, or on any other. Aside from our three ships, there aren’t any other vessels within sensor range.”

  “I understand, George,” the captain replied, looking grim. His serious demeanor was doing a very good job of hiding the acid bubbling around in his gut. He pressed a control on his chair. “Fighter bay, Captain. Commander Stenlake, I need you to launch your squadron. Once you’re outside the ship, maintain station no more than five klicks out. There’s a hostile force out there that Mondragon has gone to deal with. Two corvettes, and Captain Leicasitaj indicated that they may have hostile intent. I need you to stick close.”

  “Understood, Captain,” the woman in command of the fighter squadron replied. “I am scrambling fighters now.”

  Vincent took a controlled breath. So far, things were moving along smoothly. He was watching his sensor display, seeing Mondragon pushing her acceleration to the limit, and then…

  “Mondragon is firing her energy weapons, Captain,” George reported, confusion still infusing his voice. “I don’t understand. What the hell are they shooting at?” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Stella, can you increase sensor range and resolution? I want to try and get a look at whatever it is that they’re fighting.”

  The AI nodded, a slight twinkle in her eye. An actual twinkle, in fact, as part of her right eye was shining. “Of course, George. Increasing sensor resolution.”

  The man nodded, though his face remained confused and grim. He was adjusting controls like mad, his eyes darting from one monitor to the other. “Nothing. What the hell?”

  Stella maintained her stoic posture, but that twinkle remained. “I don’t know what to tell you, George. I’m not showing anything on the vector the Mondragon is attacking.”

  Vincent rubbed his forehead, his eyes going from his displays to Stella, to George’s intensely focused visage and back to the displays again. He sat a bit straighter. “Isis, are we on the course provided by Captain Leicasitaj?”

  “Yes, Cap, we are,” the pilot replied, nodding. “I’m accelerating, but I suspect the Chief Engineer is going to be calling in a short while. I keep upping our acceleration which means…”

  She didn’t get to finish her sentence. The comm on Vincent’s chair lit up. With a sigh, he pressed the control and Quesh Trrgoth’s voice sounded. “Captain, what the hell is going on up there?” the Parkani demanded. “Why is the helm wanting more speed? We’re heading on in system to take up orbit. We are not carrying any precious or perishable cargoes, nothing that warrants us roaring off into the black like this.”

  “Mondragon saw a threat and ordered us off at max accel,” Vincent replied, pulling every scrap of his command presence around himself like a cloak. “They’re off engaging them now.”

  There was a pause. “Pirates?”

  Vincent shrugged, though Quesh couldn’t see him. He glanced around and saw all of the worried looks his bridge crew was wearing, all but Stella. She still looked stoic, but not concerned for some reason. Vincent couldn’t figure her out. Why wasn’t she getting nervous? “Most likely. Leicasitaj said something about a pair of corvette warships coming our way. We and Silver Dawn turned and have been hauling ass. If there’s anything you can do to give us more speed, that would be appreciated.”

  “I’m on it, Captain. I can give you ten minutes at 118% on the engines, but then we’ll have to back off to seventy-five or the sublights will overheat and burn out.”

  Vincent nodded. “I’ll take it. Leave it to my engineer to save our bacon.”

  “Once again,” Quesh agreed, causing Vincent to smile. “Give me thirty seconds.”

  “Isis,” Vincent said, turning to the pilot. “Once we have the engine power, you punch it.”

  “Aye, aye, Captain,” she crowed. She had her hand over the throttles, waiting for her screens to change.

  “Serinda, get Silver Dawn on the line,” Vincent ordered.

  “Aye, Captain.” She pressed a few controls. “You’re on, Captain.”

  “Silver Dawn, this is Grania Estelle. We’re about to accelerate again in…” he checked the feeds, “fourteen seconds. I need you to try and keep up.”

  The captain of the Silver Dawn was older, in his mid-seventies, but still had a youthful bounce in his step. His face was wrinkled, he had a heavy beard and weathered skin. “I understand, Captain. Your chief of operations and her crackerjack engineers put some extra hitch in my giddy-up over here. I love this ship! Don’t you worry, Captain. I’ll keep up with you.”

  Vincent suddenly felt himself being pressed back into his chair again as the ship accelerated with the extra burst from the engines. It momentarily overcame the ship’s inertial compensators, but it wasn’t debilitating. It was uncomfortable, feeling like a heavy weight was pressing on the chest.

  “What the hell is going on?” Vincent groaned. Who the hell is attacking us?

  The pressing on the chest went on for an eternity. The two freighters roared across the system, constantly accelerating as Quesh’s timer ticked down. Gasping for breath, Vincent turned his head in George’s direction. “Anything on the sensors?”

  “Mondragon is reversing course,” George said, fighting to speak. “They’ve stopped firing, Captain.”

  The comm panel beeped. Eamonn checked the timer, as it ticked down to zero. “Isis, back off the acceleration, down to seventy-five percent.”

  As the words were coming out of his mouth, the pilot eased off on the throttles, and the metal of the superstructure of the ship groaned as the stresses eased. The great weight that had settled upon them all went away, and ever
yone on the bridge gulped in lungful’s of air, as though this was their first occasion ever doing so.

  Serinda raised her head. “Incoming message from Mondragon.”

  “Put it on the speakers,” Vincent ordered, rolling his shoulders, trying to relax the muscles.

  “This is Leicasitaj of the Mondragon. Thank you for your prompt and excellent responses in this unscheduled combat exercise. You may return to your previous vector and slow your ships’ velocity. Mondragon is resuming station.” There was a click and the call ended.

  Vincent clenched his fist and tapped his arm on the arm of his chair, gritting his teeth in fury. “Oh that little tentacley bastard. And you!” he barked, pointing right at Stella’s holo image. “You knew!”

  She nodded, beaming. “Of course I knew, Captain. I linked up with the frigate’s communications and telemetry and Captain Leicasitaj was commenting to his XO that he was going to put his crew through an impromptu exercise. I thought it was a good idea. And the fact that you continued to believe even when George nor I could detect any ships in the direction that Mondragon was firing made it all the better.” She made a little bow. “I’m sorry for the deception, Captain, but I think it helped out. I think that when there is actually an attack, we’ll be ready.”

  The others chuckled slightly, sounding relieved. Vincent sat in his chair and simply brought air into his lungs slowly, and slowly blew it back out for long moments. Finally, he spoke. “That was not funny, Stella.”

  She smiled impishly. “Yes, Captain, it really was.”

  Vincent stewed for another moment, then cracked a small smile. “Though I think when I meet up with the good warship captain again, I will remove one of his tentacles.”

  “Don’t you hurt him!” Stella said sharply, horrified. “He’s trying to protect you, and it didn’t hurt anything. In fact, checking the diagnostics, none of my components were damaged or even particularly worn by this.”

  Vincent sighed heavily. “All right, Stella. For you, I won’t hurt him. But I don’t know how accommodating I’ll be if he tries to pull something like this again.”

  The AI nodded. “I’ll let him know, Captain.”

  As they approached the habitable planet, the ships received a hail from the planet. “Captain, I’ve got Governor Vall on the line for you,” Serinda reported.

  Vincent nodded. He was glad to see that Acheron Vall was still around and that he was still considered the leader here. Whether he was actually the governor now instead of the “acting-governor” as he was the last time Grania Estelle had been here. “Put him through.” The display activated, showing the man’s smiling face. “Governor Vall, it’s good to see you again. Is it official now? You’re the governor of Vanoria?”

  Acheron Vall beamed wider. “Yes, it is. My position was made official two weeks ago, I am now the governor of the city of Vanoria. And I must say it makes me extremely happy to see you and your ship here in my star system. I assume you’re here with goods to sell?”

  “Of course,” Vincent replied. “Got a full load of goods and plenty of fuel for your reactors.”

  “I’m sure the Department of Water and Power will be happy to hear that. We haven’t been having brownouts, but things are certainly starting to run low. I think another few weeks and we would have been rationing power.”

  Vincent blinked, confused. “Wait, what? You have those three shuttles we sold you and the fuel collector in the gas giant.”

  Vall nodded. “Yes, we do.” He sighed, looking off to the side. Then he looked back. “We’re going to have to have a discussion, Captain, once you reach orbit. And I need to get that fuel from you as soon as it is possible.” The man had gone from ecstatic to near frantic in under a minute.

  “Is there are problem, Governor?” he asked, concerned.

  Vall sighed. “There is, Captain, but I don’t think it’s something that we should be discussing over the comlink. If you could please come down to the planet, we can talk about it.” He reached over and the call ended.

  Vincent pursed his lips. Now what? “I swear,” he said to no one in particular, “if this is another test, or another joke, someone is going to be very sorry.” He pointed a finger at the holo image of Stella. “I mean it, Stella.”

  She raised her hands. “I promise you, Captain, I don’t know anything about this. But I will find out.”

  “Good, do that. George, are we in range for some close scans of the city?”

  The man nodded. “Yes, Captain, we are. Beginning sensor sweeps. What am I looking for?”

  Vincent shrugged, considering. “I’m not sure, really. But with the governor talking about fuel problems, I’d start there. Check on the shuttles, see if you can find them. They’re probably in a hangar or something, but it’s a place to start. If he’s complaining that there isn’t enough fuel in the tanks then there are only two reasons: either there’s a problem with the shuttles or there’s a problem with the collector.” He nodded, pressing a control. “Engineering, Bridge.”

  “Quesh here, Captain,” the Parkani’s gruff voice answered. “You aren’t about to tell me that I need to increase engine power again, are you? Because this is not a good time for that.”

  “No, Quesh. We’re coming up into standard orbit over Vanoria, and we’re going to be sending down cargo shuttles in a bit. No, what I need is for you to get a small team together and take one of the shuttles out to the fueling collector we left here.”

  “The collector? Why?”

  “The local governor made comment that there was a fuel problem here and that our load is desperately needed. We sold them enough the last time and with the collector they should have had enough of a reserve to make it at least another month.”

  “You’re right,” the Parkani replied after a moment’s thought. “They should have. I’ll get a team out there on shuttle three in a few minutes.”

  “Good. If there’s any damage, fix it. If the fuel bladders are full, transfer the fuel over to the shuttle, and once your team is finished, bring the fuel back.”

  “On it, Captain. Anything else?”

  “Yeah, tell them to be safe.” He ended the call. “Serinda, tell Ardeth to get the cargo division ready. We should be reaching orbit in less than half an hour, I want him and his ready to start loading up the shuttles to bring down the goods to sell. And talk to Korqath too. I want him to have some of his pilots to fly Combat Aerospace Patrol around the freighters in orbit and also to have four of his fighters escort the shuttles when they go down.” He pressed another control while Serinda started making her call. “Security, Bridge.”

  “Go for Security,” Saiphirelle’s voice came back.

  “Sai, it’s the Captain. We’re going to be sending down cargo shuttles in the next few minutes,” he told her, nodding. There was a plan now. “I’m not expecting much in the way of trouble from the locals, but I want to be prepared.”

  “How prepared are we talking about, Captain?” the lupusan asked, sounding as though she was getting up from the desk and moving around.

  He let out a long breath. “Go whole hog, Sai. Armor, full weapons, grenades, all of it. We are not going to take any chances, though I would prefer if you didn’t do a full breach when they land. If things are particularly bad, just abort the landing and get back up to the ship.”

  “Understood. I’ll take care of our people, Captain, don’t you worry yourself about it.” She sounded very confident about that. And she had the track record to back that up, Vincent knew. He took a deep breath and just hoped that she wouldn’t start shooting with only the slightest provocation.

  “Good. Gear up.” He cut the connection. Saiphirelle was smart, tough and resourceful. She’d do what needed to be done to take care of the cargo, the shuttles and most importantly, the crew. He hoped upon hope that her sense of duty and protection would not give her the idea to strike first and deal with the fallout later.

  “Captain, I’ve got something,” Ykzann called out from Mondragon’s se
nsor station.

  “What is it?” Leicasitaj asked, looking up from his display.

  The zheen chittered to himself for a moment. “There’s a ship parked on the surface, not one of the company shuttles.”

  His facial tentacles started to writhe. “What kind of ship? A warship?”

  “Doesn’t look like it, no, sir,” the zheen replied. “Looks like a cargo ship, roughly about the size of Silver Dawn, but it’s clearly not in as pristine shape. Looks like this one has seen some use. It’s parked outside the city of Vanoria on the southern edge, next to a big warehouse.”

  “A cargo ship?” Leicasitaj said slowly. “Is it broadcasting a beacon ID?”

  Another chitter. “No sir. It’s powered down at the moment, but it isn’t in our database registry.”

  The Romigani gave out a gurgling sigh. “No, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. We got that database from Grania Estelle and while they have been all over this Cluster, they haven’t met every ship flying. It’s possible it’s just another independent operator who came here to do business, either with the local government or some small business. Either way, it’s a good thing, I suppose,” he mused. “If it’s more than just ships from Seylonique coming this way, can only help with trade and moving goods and credits. I’m sure Captain Eamonn will be pleased about this.”

  “You sure about that, sir?” Garidhak asked from Tactical. “He is a merchant skipper, after all. How well does he take to competition?”

  “Well, I don’t really know,” Leicasitaj admitted. “But I can’t imagine he’d be too upset about having another tradeship moving through this part of the Cluster. More tradeships means more trade, which means more businesses making and moving goods. All of which means trade and profit. Which I know the good Captain will be interested in.”

  “Chief, do you have a minute?” Stella asked, appearing on one of the Main Engineering displays.