by Chris Hechtl
“When she's down leave her alive,” the Admiral said, countermanding his last order. “I want answers,” he said grimly as a medic worked on his head wound. Another medic was picking off pieces of debris from a dead rating. “Leave him. Someone get my steward. I need my suit,” he growled.
The medic looked up and then dropped the wire he had been holding. A cold stern look from the Admiral had him scurrying to obey.
“Sir, she may be coming around. Or trying to stay on our wounded flank,” Tactical replied.
“Then roll ship and engage with primaries!” the Admiral snarled. He slapped the medic's hand away and leaned over the console, eyes cold as he watched the little ship frantically jink to keep him from getting a target lock. He knew it would be in vain.
The large ship disabled Echo with a force beam barrage. Echo tumbled off, reactor and drive down, a dead stick.
<----*----*----*---->
The cobra's erupted out of stealth just as the Horathian warships rallied to face Bounty and her two corvettes. A single strafing run between the unarmed ships allowed the trio of fighters to disable the larger ship's drives and sensors, rendering them helpless. They drifted, screaming for help.
Once they were certain their prey was helpless the cobras went back into stealth and then changed their headings for their next phase.
<----*----*----*---->
The Arrow class launched fighters. Twelve angry red wasps formed up off the ship and then arrowed toward the three ships that had dared do so much damage. “Sir...”
“I see it,” the Admiral said grimly. Things were going to get ugly. He had thought about holding one of the three fighters back, but he was now glad he hadn't. The next phase would be dicey enough.
“Move defense pod two between us and the fighters. Can either of the corvettes handle the other pod or pods?”
“We're not sure sir,” Enric replied.
“Find out,” the Admiral said, looking at Bounty's avatar. The avatar nodded.
“Signal going out. Echo has drive failure and is adrift. Romeo is... no response. Their communications may be out Admiral,” the AI said.
The Admiral thought briefly of Ian, Apple, and Sindri and then nodded once. They would be alive or dead, only fate knew for certain right now. But he was going to stay to find out. He wouldn't let them fall into enemy hands again.
“Admiral, Echo reports Romeo has been destroyed. They got off as many as they could. They are down. Force beam attack.”
“Damn,” Enric muttered softly. The Admiral's eyes cut to the young man and nodded briefly.
“The Adrienne is on her Admiral. I think they may want to take her alive,” Miss Nobeki reported. “Commander McGuyver reported his self destruct is out.”
“Crap,” another rating said. “What do we do?”
“Sprite...”
“Another cyber attack?” Sprite asked. “They will be expecting it Admiral. I'm not certain what we can do,” she said.
“Anything is better than nothing. Disrupt their communications, give them sensor ghosts, anything you can think of.”
“Shell game?” Sprite suggested.
“No,” the Admiral said. “First off, we've got two decoys and three ships. Second, they are too close; they have already locked us up. It would be a waste of resources,” he said.
“Not if we can time it right. But I agree,” Sprite said. “Can I borrow Defender and anyone else?”
“I'm busy coordinating damage control and managing the ship,” Bounty said. “Phoenix is down Commander.”
“So I'll see about Proteus,” Sprite replied. The Admiral nodded.
“Good luck,” he said.
“We make our own,” Sprite responded.
Alone, the Admiral considered fleeing but refused. His people were out there; he didn't want to leave them alone again. Never again. He checked the status board.
The AI’s had disabled the civilian ships and some of the warships by invading their network and scramming their reactors, forcing them to run on sublight reaction thrusters. The enemy Arboth destroyer had been taken out this way, left to drift helpless. But now the enemy had gotten wise. The ships that had not been in range of the cyber attack or that had somehow recovered from it shut down their communications and moved in. The better part of Tango 3, six gunships and the one Horseshoe frigate were on their way in, passing the flagship. But ahead of them were the Horathian fighters.
“Admiral, good news, Echo is alive. And she has most of Romeo's crew as well. The bad news is they are without power. Sindri's working on restoring their reserves but things are iffy in his words.”
“Very well,” Irons replied. He looked at the plot. Echo was adrift, headed up and away from the fighting. Fortunately out of range of the other ships now.
“They've got about a day's worth of life support,” Bounty reported.
“Hopefully we can help them in that time,” Miss Nobeki murmured. “But right now, we have to stay alive first,” she said.
“Agreed.”
“Fighters are five minutes out and closing,” Bounty reported to the quiet bridge. “Sir, the force is comprised of four Cobra, four Cutlass, two Raptors, one Sabre, and one Executor class fighters. It looks like the Executor is the squadron leader.”
“How do you know that sir?” Enric asked absently.
“The Executor has the longest legs, best armor, best shields and is also transmitting the most encrypted data,” the ship AI replied.
“Oh,” Enric said.
“Any other fighters? Just the twelve?” Irons asked.
“Yes sir. It looks like Intel got that part right, they were short,” Sprite replied.
“Very well,” Irons said. He studied them. Cobras were his favorites, they were a multirole fighter. Cutlasses were a generation older but were his second favorite. They had been made in massive numbers and had still been in production when the Xeno war had started. They were one of the few multirole fighters that didn't require an augmented pilot to fly. They had been designed to be used by reserve or militia forces that didn't have the time or credits to spend training and augmenting pilots.
They had also been favorites of pirates and privateers, he thought with a pang. Which was what they were seeing here.
The Raptors were ancient, over fifteen hundred years old and used by militia forces. They had still been in production, the fighter was little more than a ship wrapped around a destroyer's laser. She had only particle shields, little defenses, no missiles, but she was blistering fast.
The Sabre was tricky, she had been built by the alien Riska to defend their homeworld, but the design had been licensed out to several corporations. She was a U shaped fighter with weapons mounted on the forward swept arms. The arms had powerful force emitters embedded on the inside edges. They could create a near impenetrable forward shield, or a force beam that could tear into a target. She had two grasers mounted in the wing roots as well, as well as six missile hard points on her ventral and dorsal sides.
The Executor however was the most powerful of all the fighters. She was an E class, designed for modular components and multirole ability. Her core was the same as that of an Emperor, Eliminator, Epsilon, Essence, or Etenger class.
He agreed with Bounty, most likely the squadron Commander, possibly even the Arrow’s CAG was on board. She was Veraxin in design, with a bug shape, all angles, points, and curves. She had four drive pods, two point defense lasers, two internal missile tubes with six missiles each and most importantly of all, two capital ship grasers, one on each flank. To top that off, her drive pods put out an impressive shield as well.
“Time to fighters reaching outer defensive shell four minutes,” Miss Nobeki said.
<----*----*----*---->
The Horathian fighter squadron was unprepared for real war, but angry and eager to strike back. That was good, but most had stopped listening and paying attention. That was bad. Their discipline also fell apart when the shit hit the fan Commander Trevor Halsey
noted angrily. He had finally gotten them into formation and off in the direction of the enemy. “Quit fooling around and wasting fuel!” He snarled over the squadron link.
“CAG! Where do we go?!”
“Form up on me and we'll take the fight to them. All the way in. Orient on my IFF. We're going after Bounty. The traitors will pay for what they've done.”
“Sir, we don't have the firepower to scratch that ship!” a voice said. Halsey checked the link. It was Ensign Fred Rogers, the rookie.
“Lock it down rook. We'll get in and tear her a new one. I've got enough firepower alone to make her regret ever changing sides,” the Commander growled.
<----*----*----*---->
The Admiral noted that the fighters were finally getting their acts together. They had finally formed up into a coherent formation and stopped moving off to attack his fighters or a nearby corvette. “They are certainly stirred up Admiral. Like Nubian Wasps,” Enric reported. “They are concentrating on us. The other ships can't support us.”
“They are swarming indeed. From their speed, mass, and energy readings, I do not detect any torpedoes you should note,” Bounty, reported.
“Well, that's a good thing,” Enric replied. He sounded momentarily relieved.
“Even the sting of a dozen wasps can inflict damage,” the Ssilli replied. “That is if we let them sting us.”
“Not if we can help it,” the Admiral growled. “Move beam one out to intercept.”
“Aye sir, moving beam one out on a reciprocal path. Be advised, we're going to lose it Admiral. She's low on juice,” Lieutenant Nobeki said, using her implants to order the beam platform moved.
“It can't be helped,” the Admiral replied. “You call the shot Lieutenant,” he said.
“Aye sir, guns...” Nobeki bit her lip, focusing with intense concentration on the feed in her mind. “They are entering outer range now. Passing through the outer range, initial targeting on the greatest mass, we have lock. Firing,” she said.
When the fighter's entered the outer defensive shell range Lieutenant Nobeki hit them with force beam emitter 1. The beam emitter platform lined to take as many fighters as possible in one shot.
The pilots received a threat warning and instincts warred with orders briefly. A few jinked high or low, spreading the formation.
Seven of the fighters managed to get out of the weapon platform's engagement range. The other five fighters drifted lifeless, their ships dead, their pilots gasping their last breaths of priceless air.
The squadron Commander took revenge on the unmanned weapons platform by making a firing run before it could recharge. It was blown apart. Then he turned on the ship that had launched it. His scattered force regrouped.
“You have to admire a fighter jock. More balls than brains. In a situation like this, against a prepared foe, he should back off.”
“But he's not.”
“Probably more afraid of getting in trouble with the brass if they thought he was a coward,” Bounty replied.
“That only happens if he survives this. Which he won't,” Sprite replied. She paused a moment. “I've tried to get in, the fighter's computers aren't accepting input.”
“Understood.”
<----*----*----*---->
The surviving fighters hit one of the decoys, and crowed over the destruction. “Yes! Now that's what I'm talking about!”
“Can it! Get it together people! By the numbers,” Halsey snarled. He'd lost five fighters, but the others still hadn't wised up. Blowing apart the decoy had thrown his formation into chaos, and again he had to haul them back into formation. If they were going to have a chance in hell at hitting the Bounty they needed numbers. Or at least he did, the others had little chance in surviving.
Three of the ships lost had been raptors; the other two had been his Sabre and a cutlass. Roger's last Raptor had a snowballs chance in hell of surviving what was about to come, but the kid was stubbornly sticking in there.
“Sir, there is another platform coming up above us. Bearing one o'clock high,” Rogers reported.
Halsey frowned, looking at it for a moment. It was clouded in the snow of sensor jamming, but he did pick out one thing which made him relax slightly. “Ignore it. Another damn decoy. It doesn't have any force emitter signatures,” he said.
When they passed the defense platform it erupted, hammering at them with point defense weapons. Lasers that were good at hitting fast moving missiles were equally good at striking fighters. Four of the fighters were destroyed; another tumbled away missing a wing and an engine.
Furious Halsey took his fighter in a tight banking loop. He rounded on the platform, hammering it with a pair of missiles but the platform fought back, shooting them out of the sky and then firing on him. Angry he fired all his missiles and then hit it with his main guns, winging it as it jinked and fired on the missiles. The capital beams tore into the unarmored platform like it was tissue paper. Unfortunately the beams hadn't killed it.
“One more to be sure,” Halsey muttered as he swung about to take another pass at it.
The platform self destructed a moment later, taking his fighter out as it made another firing pass, this time too close to evade the explosion.
<----*----*----*---->
The last two fighters came in gallantly. Bounty's tactical witch took one out with precision fire with a laser. The second made a single strafing run, hitting the shields with a weak Gauss rifle before it tumbled off into space with a hole in its stern from Bounty's return fire.
“And that's that,” Miss Nobeki said, smiling. She had sweat beading her forehead. She looked tired but game.
“Good job guns,” Irons replied. “Take a moment and relax and get some food or visit the head. Bounty, Sprite, and I will cover for you,” he said.
“Sir are you sure?” Enric asked, sounding concerned.
Irons looked at the plot. “We're okay. We've got a few minutes. Don't leave the bridge,” he said, pointing to the small door near the back that led to the head and washroom.
Enric nodded and got up. He waved to the tactical officer. “Ladies first ma'am,” he said, smiling politely.
She returned the smile, flexing her hands over and over to get feeling into them as she headed to the head. Her knees felt like jelly but strangely she felt good. Some of her friends had no doubt died, but so far so good.
Chapter 25
“Sir! Enemy fighters coming in bearing one twenty one, mark one ten low!” a rating called out in warning. Bluefield looked up at the plot in sick dread in time to realize things were going from bad to worse.
He had been handling the damage control since Mister Travesh had been electrocuted and had been sent to the overloaded infirmary. The ship was heavily damaged by the missile attack; he was just getting a handle on it when this happened. He could barely see, the bridge environmental was still dealing with the smoke and ozone. Burnt smells clogged his nose, making his eyes tear. Angrily he wiped at them, forcing himself to focus.
“What the hell are they doing? There are only three of them!”
“It's a torpedo attack,” Guns replied coughing. “We should have kept a CAP flight to cover us,” he said, coughing again. “Our keel has been torn up. Captain, we need to flip,” the tactical officer said.
“Helm, roll us one eighty! Evasive! All defenses fire!”
He realized his error; he should have kept a better eye on the larger picture while someone else handled damage control. Unfortunately there wasn't time anymore for self-recrimination. No time at all.
<----*----*----*---->
The trio of Cobra fighters came out of stealth five hundred thousand kilometers away from the remaining enemy warships, coming up from below and on their starboard side. The three little fighters came in loaded for bear. They made a torpedo run on the remaining enemy warships. Their target was the battlecruiser.
“We can't go up against that!” Ezri said as the three ships erupted in defensive fire. The fighter's small du
mb AI plotted the weapons fire and firing arches, giving them an angle of attack. They could see all three ships attempting to maneuver, rolling to keep their damaged hull away from the threat.
“Stick to the plan Ezri!” Meia ordered.
“Hell with that!” Ezri replied. At the last minute Ezri lost his nerve and changed targets to the Antelope destroyer. Dita and Meia followed the plan and shifted targets to the Arrow at the last minute.
“Fire one! Fire two! Torpedoes away! ” Dita and Meia sang out together. They missed Ezri's report.
They each launched a pair of torpedoes. A lucky hit slammed into both the Arrow and the destroyer, taking the destroyer's shields down and scramming her reactor with an EMP burst. It drifted, lights flashing as her crew went to work to contain and handle the damage.
The Arrow was less fortunate, she was half way through her roll with her slit of a flank pointed at the fighters. She took one of the torpedoes in her flank, right into the notch leading to her open carrier deck. The Arrow lacked sufficient armor on her carrier deck; the fusion warhead tore her apart from the inside. Captain Bluefield had one moment to realize his ship was doomed before he knew no more.
“We did it!” Ezri crowed, grinning as he swept near the battlecruiser and raked it with fire for good measure.
“Ezri get out of there! You're too close!” Meia warned.
However Ezri's fighter had strayed too close to the battlecruiser as he crowed victory. The large capital ship lashed out, blowing apart the fighter in revenge for its fallen comrades.
Dita flinched as Ezri's crow was cut short. “He's gone, just... gone,” she said and then her ship bucked as it took fire. She jinked and wove, doing her best to avoid the lashing beams and flying metal. Something bucked, hitting her in the port wing and she spun, now out of control.
“Meia!” Dita cried as her fighter took fire.
“Dita move!” Meia said, jinking and kicking out decoys and flares. She scissored behind Dita's fighter as the ship took a glancing hit on her shields, knocking them down. One of Dita's decoy's exploded, pinging her stern with tiny bits of debris. Her engine sputtered briefly.