“Quiet down!” Kirkland said, stepping forward. “Disperse, right now!”
“There’s a PacFed commander in there,” one of the technicians, an Ordnance Technician named Caldwell yelled. “We want him, and we want him now!”
“The Captain needs to interrogate him,” Kirkland replied.
“You couldn’t trust anything he said,” Caldwell said, stepping forward. “Commander, we’re going to take this bastard, and we’re going to throw whatever is left of him out of the airlock. I had a husband and two kids. Because of him, I’ll never see them again.”
“I had friends on Yorktown,” another member of the mob added. “His fighters killed them.” The crowd paused for a second, then slowly began to move forward, forming a wall that blocked the corridor while pressing against the guards. The two men standing in front of the door looked at each other, then at Kirkland, silently begging for instructions.
Romano took a deep breath, pulled out his sidearm, and stepped forward, leveling the pistol at Caldwell, saying, “That’s far enough, Specialist. I’m going to give you one more chance to disperse. Clear the deck and return to your quarters on the double, and I will try and convince the Captain to overlook this. You get one mulligan. Only one. And then I shoot.”
“You’d shoot me to protect a PacFed commander?” Caldwell asked, looking at him in disbelief. “Who are you working for?”
“I am a commissioned officer in the United States Space Force,” he replied. “You will obey my lawful orders, or face the consequences. Mutiny in a time of war is punishable by death. I’m just skipping over the formalities of a court-martial.”
“He can’t get all of us!” a voice near the back called. “Rush them.”
“Not a chance,” Kirkland said, drawing her pistol. “We’ve got sixteen rounds apiece.”
“They won’t do it!” the voice said.
“Someone at the back seems pretty damned brave,” Romano said. “Why don’t you come up here where we can all get a real close look at you, admire your courage in person. Come on, what are you waiting for?” He took a step forward, and said, “You’re in the United States Space Force. If that means a damn to you, then get back to your quarters on the double! All we have left is each other. Don’t toss that away because of some PacFed bastard. Don’t you get it? This helps them.”
Caldwell glared at Romano, and said, “When this is over...”
“Bad idea to threaten a superior officer, Specialist. Get the hell out of here.”
Finally, belatedly, the master-at-arms arrived, the burly Barbara Grogan with rifle in hand. The crowd looked back at the veteran spacer, and at last began to disperse, shuffling down the corridors, snatching rueful glances at the brig. Kirkland walked over to the guards, shaking her head.
“That should never have happened, and you both know it. What the hell were you doing out here in the first place? You’re meant to be on the other side of the door.” Taking a deep breath, she added, “Call your relief, then consider yourself confined to quarters until your next duty shift. Is that clear.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the senior said, while his partner glared at Kirkland.
“Where the hell were you?” Kirkland asked, turning to Grogan.
“Stuck in an elevator, Commander,” the red-faced woman replied. “Someone implemented a security override, locked out the whole system. It took a while to get it working again.”
Turning to Kirkland, Romano said, “I don’t like the implications of that, Commander. That’s something that could only have been done by a senior officer.” Looking around, he added, “If it comes to that, how many people knew that the PacFed prisoner was locked in there.”
“What PacFed prisoner?” Grogan asked.
“Thank you for proving my point, Chief,” Romano replied. “Commander, we’ve got a bigger problem that we thought. The saboteur has to be working with someone who was at that meeting. One of the senior staff.”
Kirkland’s face grew pale, and she replied, “Be careful what you are implying.” Looking at the brig, she said, “We’ve got to go to the Captain at once.”
Shaking his head, Romano replied, “We don’t dare.”
“You’re not suggesting that Captain Forrest is the saboteur?” Grogan said, stepping forward, her rifle raised. “I’ve served with her for years, and...”
“Right now, Chief, I don’t know what to think.” Looking at Kirkland, Romano said, “Someone we should be able to trust is working against us. It’s going to be down to the three of us to stop him.”
Nodding, Kirkland glanced at her watch, and said, “One more problem. Ten hours from now, we’re going to war. If we don’t find the traitor by then...”
She didn’t finish the sentence. She didn’t have to.
Chapter 15
Flynn gently eased his fighter around, watching the sensor display as the bombers swept in behind him, ready to launch their strike. Warning lights flashed across his console as the defensive fire intensified, threatening to overwhelm his particle beams, but he pressed on regardless, knowing that it was their only chance. Then, from the port, he saw a series of lights that filled him with dread. An enemy fighter squadron, closing on the attack, catching his squadron on the flank.
It was all over in seconds, and the canopy of the simulator rose as a doleful dirge played over the speakers, Benedetti climbing out of her cockpit as Tanaka looked on, datapad in hand, a smug expression on his face.
“Where the hell did those fighters come from?” Flynn asked. “Thin air?”
“The Guild hid them on one of the moons, in a concealed surface installation that we missed on the sensor sweep.” Tapping the datapad, the pilot added, “I had three other surprises in mind, all of them based on Guilder tactical doctrine, and I haven’t even started with the PacFed package yet. Any way you choose to count the numbers, we’re facing significant odds against us.”
“I didn’t like that approach much, anyway,” Benedetti added. “Too easy.”
“Too easy?” Flynn asked. “It took twenty minutes to pick our way though the outer rocks.” Looking at Tanaka, he added, “And that’s the problem. We take too long to find a path through, and by the time we’ve cut our way into an attack pattern, they’ve had more than enough time to prepare for our attack.” Looking at his two senior subordinates, he asked, “Got any bright ideas?”
“Only for beating us back,” Tanaka replied, shaking his head. “I’m not sure we can pull this one off, Commander. Maybe we’re going about this the wrong way. Instead of trying for a kill, maybe we just try for damage. Hit them hard enough to buy some time to build up more strength.”
“They’ve got a lot more assets to bring in than we do,” Benedetti warned. “Any delay only works in their favor, not ours. Somehow, we’ve got to find a way to strike a killing blow, and we’ve got to do it on the first pass.”
“With six missiles? One missile per fighter?”
“We’ve got eighteen missiles with us,” she replied. “All we have to do is work out some way of using them all at once. Could we fire them from Lincoln, use the magnetic catapults to launch them in series?”
“Not without getting the ship far too close to the enemy for safety. Even if I’d go along with it, the Captain wouldn’t,” Flynn said. “Can you carry multiple missiles?”
“Only if I want to get out and push,” Benedetti replied. “We’re pushing the performance envelope as it is. What about that pet shuttle of yours? It’s large enough to carry half a dozen of them, and it’s got the maneuverability to pull it off. I know it doesn’t have hardpoints, but we can compensate for that. Just push them out of the cargo airlock and let them fly.”
“That’d work,” Tanaka said, nodding in approval. “It’d take some modifications, but it’s within specs. I think we could pull it off.” His smile dropped to a frown, and he added, “Though it would be a ni
ghtmare working through the defensive fire with that sort of performance. The cannons aren’t mounted in the right place. Nobody intended those ships to ride into fire.”
“There’s got to be an answer, somewhere,” Flynn said.
“Trojan Horse?” Benedetti suggested. “Pretend that Sinaga has escaped.” Shaking her head, she said, “No, that’d just make them more likely to open fire. We’ve got to find a way to sneak in, and we’ve got to find a way to destroy those ships with a single shot.”
“What yield do those missiles have again?”
“Ten kiloton. One’s usually enough for a disabling shot, but they’ve got to be rigged at close range. They’ve got no real maneuverability to speak of. That’s why we needed you guys to fly cover for us last time. We’d never have pressed that attack home by ourselves.” Shaking her head, she added, “You’re right. That shuttle will have the flying characteristics of a rock.”
“That’s it!” Flynn’s eyes lit up, and he reached for a datapad, his hands dancing across the controls.
“I’m not going to like this, am I,” Benedetti said.
“Come on, come on,” he muttered. “There.” Pulling out his communicator, he said, “Specialists Donovan and Lopez, report to the Training Deck on the double. On the double.”
“Now I’m really confused,” Tanaka said. At Benedetti’s glance, he added, “I understand Lopez. We might need her for some e-warfare, and she’s the best hacker we’ve got, but Donovan’s a Ship’s Stores Assistant. Works for Gonzales, down in the enlisted mess. You wanting a snack, Commander?”
“Little lesson for you, Lieutenant. Always find out what hidden specialties the crew have. Ronnie was working on a masters in geology when we left, by correspondence. Planned to do his doctorate, and is a specialist in asteroid mining.”
“And you just happened to know that?” Benedetti replied. “I’m impressed.”
Blushing, he said, “Actually, Commander Brooks introduced us. We were working on a tiger team to figure out how we might adapt some of our fighter sensor arrays for prospecting. Just in case things didn’t work out at Zemlya.”
“Commander…,” Tanaka began.
“Raul, I think we’ve reached the stage in our relationship where you can call me Jack, especially when nobody else is around,” Flynn said. He walked over to the wall, pulling up the images of the target, and said, “The enemy are nestled here, in between two big rocks.”
Nodding, Benedetti said, “They’re co-orbital, swinging around each other. A few debris fields, but nothing that can’t be handled. Hell for a capital ship to get in there, though. That’s probably why they picked it. That whole area is a mess. Last time we swung through, I lost two fighters, both of them in the shrapnel fields. Nasty stuff.”
“And this was caused by a collision, a recent one,” Flynn said. “So nothing has had time to settle down yet.”
“No, but the orbits are stable on any sort of timeline you can think of.”
“Not what I was thinking,” he said. “Not what I was thinking.” The door opened, and the bemused Donovan walked into the room, still wearing her coveralls. “Ah, Specialist, come in, come in. I need your expert advice on something.”
“Anything I can do to help, sir.”
“Tell me about unstable asteroids, Specialist.” Gesturing at the display, he added, “These are only recently created, formed by an interplanetary collision. I’m guessing that means that they are still within the process of forming, that gravity hasn’t quite finished with them yet?”
“That’s a rather simplistic way of putting it, sir.” She paused, then said, “How old are they?”
“About eight thousand years,” Benedetti said.
“Without a full analysis, I can’t be specific, but...”
“Best guess will do, Specialist,” Flynn pressed.
“Then I would expect to find that they are weak, with a good many flaws. Orbits in flux, and a lot of shrapnel and debris. Landing on one of the asteroids would be extremely difficult, in my opinion. You’d have to go in with a spacesuit, and even then, it’d be pretty treacherous. I’d recommend staying well clear.”
“And just what could you do with eighty kilotons of shaped atomic charge?”
“You want to blow up one of the asteroids?” Tanaka said. “Good God.”
“Not enough,” Donovan said. “Not by a couple of orders of magnitude. You’d need more like a gigaton or two for that sort of job.”
“No,” Flynn replied. “I don’t want to blow it up. Just knock enough fast-moving shrapnel into the sky to destroy a flotilla of ships at anchor. I want to make a comprehensive mess, Specialist, and I need you to show us how to do it.”
Donovan was speechless for a moment, before saying, “Perhaps. It might be possible. If you could find a flaw, something deep enough to set the charges. It wouldn’t be accurate, more like a shotgun blast. What sort of range are we talking about?”
“Fifty miles.”
“Do we have short-range sensor data?”
“I’m afraid not, Specialist. Can you put something together on the fly?”
“On the fly?” her eyes bulged, and she replied, “Sir, with all respect, you don’t know what you’re asking! It usually takes months to prepare for a detonation. One wrong move, and...”
“And debris can fly all over the place, destroying every ship in sight?” Benedetti said. “Given that’s what we’re aiming for, maybe we can cut a few items off the checklist.”
“Maybe, but...” Shaking her head, she said, “I’m sorry, sir, but I don’t think it can be done. Not in the time. You’d need weeks to complete a survey like that, to work out all the geologic flaws. I suppose the landing team setting the charges might be able to have a stab at it, but...”
“Missiles. We’ll be launching missiles.”
Looking from pilot to pilot, Donovan said, “You’re serious, sir?”
“Deadly.”
“You’d have to hit precisely the right spot. Down to the last couple of meters. Any deviation, and in all likelihood, nothing will happen. I suppose a probe could be guided into the target as a homing beacon, but...” She looked up at the screen, and asked, “Are you proposing to do this in the middle of a battle, Commander?”
“That’s the intention. Though we’ll have protection.”
“Any jamming, and we’re dead. You’d have to launch the missiles at close range. I mean, really close range. Close enough not to require any course changes during flight. It’d look a lot more like a bombing run than a missile attack. Even then, it’s going to be chancy.”
“It’s not even that simple,” Tanaka said. “They’ll throw everything they’ve got at you. If they can take out your shuttle, the war will be over, and they’re going to know it. What we’re doing will be too damned obvious.”
“Not necessarily,” Flynn said. “Not if we launch the attack they’re expecting. We need a two-stage bluff. The fighter wing proceeds as planned...”
“And gets torn to pieces,” Tanaka protested.
“Not necessarily,” Benedetti replied. “We can feint, make it look as though we’re launching a direct attack on the fleet, and fool their defenses. Then veer off in good time to pick our way through the asteroids. I think it can work.”
“Except, ma’am, that I can’t tell you where to strike, and without precision targeting, I don’t see how the attack can succeed.”
Lopez ambled into the room, looking at the assembled officers, and asked, “You wanted to see me, Commander?”
“How long to hack into the enemy’s computer network?”
“Can I use both hands?” she replied, cracking a smile, met with a collection of somber faces in response. “It’s not as easy as that, sir. I need to know what you want me to do.”
“I need geological information.” Turning to Donovan, he continued, �
��The Guilders must have done some sort of surface survey. Those rocks are their best sources of the minerals they’ll need to get those ships ready for action, and I can’t see them passing up that resource.”
“So no data alternation?” Lopez asked. “You just want me to poke around in the network? I can do that. I’ll need to be as close as possible, though, and I’ll want some Zemlyan equipment. They’ve had a lot more practice hacking enemy systems than we have.”
“Komarov, then,” Flynn replied. “They can jump in close to the debris field.”
“Away from Lincoln?” Tanaka asked. “We won’t be able to protect them properly.”
“If they jump in a few minutes after Lincoln, with any luck, the Guild forces will already be engaged with ours,” Benedetti replied. She smiled, and said, “I think we might actually be onto something here.”
“Only if every single step goes exactly according to plan,” Tanaka warned. “One mistake, and we could lose the entire fleet.”
“Hell, we knew that going in,” Benedetti said. “Look at what we gain by pulling it off, though! All the PacFed ships, destroyed. Four, maybe six more monitors wiped out. They’ve put all their eggs in a single basket, and we can scramble the lot with a single well-placed shot. Chances like this just don’t come very often.”
“And that,” Tanaka said, “That is what scares me. It’s all wrapped up in a nice package, and I can’t help but think that it all looks too damn easy.”
“You think this assault is going to be easy?”
“No, but we’ve managed to come up with a viable plan a little too quickly.” Turning to Flynn, he said, “Jack, it’s a risk, and a big one. If they’ve made any other preparations, we could be running right into a trap.”
Never In Vain (Lincoln's War Book 2) Page 13