“Is that no one will be left at Edsall Dark to defend it?” Westmoreland finished for her.
Theoretically, the Athens Destroyers could figure out what was happening and pass wide of Dela Turkomann. The forces Morgan had assembled above the desert moon would be waiting for a battle that would never be fought there. Instead, the Vonnegan fleet would take control of Edsall Dark without firing a single cannon.
They stared at each other without blinking.
Morgan said, “I don’t envision Mowbray as someone who wants to make tactical victories. I think he would rather have the galaxy know that he crushed us head-on.”
Westmoreland nodded. “And we can’t forget the enemy we are facing. We are outnumbered three to one. If this battle goes the way the numbers predict they will”—Morgan started to protest but Westmoreland held a hand up to finish—“then maybe the best thing is for no one to be at Edsall Dark when it is over.”
“Westmoreland—”
He shook his head and patted her on the shoulder. If an officer her own age did the same thing, she might break his fingers or his wrist. But Westmoreland thought of her as an equal and this was how he treated his closest confidantes, so she only smiled.
“I expect to win every battle I go into,” he said. “And now that Vere has freed the Excalibur Armada, our odds have greatly improved. But only the foolish general goes into battle thinking there is no way he can lose. If we are defeated here, I wouldn’t want my friends or family living on Edsall Dark when Mowbray’s forces get there.”
She looked up at the sky, at the fleet of Solar Carriers orbiting the moon. Beyond them, the sun was twice the size she was used to seeing it when she was back on Edsall Dark. On the other side of the horizon, one of Mego Turkomann’s other moons, the purple sphere named Dela Raspatin, was only slightly smaller. In between the sun and the moon, the newly activated portal blazed with pure white energy.
After considering everything Westmoreland had said, she knew he was right. The circumstances of the battle, of her army, and of the approaching enemy fleet hadn’t changed. The Vonnegan forces were still greater than the collection of ships she commanded. It was the correct decision to conduct the battle above Dela Turkomann instead of Edsall Dark. But it was also good sense to clear their home world and the CasterLan capital in case the battle didn’t go their way.
She signaled for Pistol to come over and join them. Unlike everyone else on the moon’s blazing hot surface, the android was completely free of perspiration. Morgan had a bandana around her forehead to stop the flow of sweat into her eyes. Westmoreland constantly dabbed a handkerchief at his face. But Pistol looked the same as he did in the freezing cold or anywhere else.
“How can I help you, Morgan?”
“Send word back to Edsall Dark. Tell them I want a complete evacuation of Edsall Dark. Everyone, not just the engineers and pilots, should head to Vere’s coordinates near Eta Orbitae.”
“When would you like this to take place?”
Realistically, it would take a day to assemble all of the ships and get people aboard them.
“I want them up in space and on their way there,” she said, “in the next ten minutes.”
62
From the command deck of his Supreme Athens Destroyer, Mowbray could clearly see the first twelve ships ahead of him. The row of cannons on either side of the giant vessels. The haze of light from their thrusters. Although the other Destroyers were also straight ahead, they were too far away to see any part of them other than the engines and the faint outline of their frame. The ships furthest away appeared to be nothing more than blinking stars off in the distance. The only reason he knew they were Athens Destroyers was because their thrusters flared in a light blue color anytime there was a slight change in direction.
“My Lord?”
Mowbray turned. One of his senior officers was there. On his chest was a curved insignia, no larger than a finger, indicating he was one of the very few people in Mowbray’s fleet who had access to the top level of classified information. The man’s shoulders were decorated with ribbons from previous deployments.
All around Mowbray were officers trying to outdo each other with the amount of medals and ribbons they wore on their purple uniforms. Mowbray allowed these decorations because they increased group morale, but he did not partake in them himself. Instead, he wore a plain gray uniform, but with lines of purple and black down the side and under his vest.
Upon making eye contact with the Vonnegan ruler, the officer gave a slight bow of his head. Mowbray nodded but said nothing.
The officer merely held out his hand, said, “The latest intelligence report, My Lord,” and gave Mowbray a small metal cube.
Mowbray nodded and took possession of the object. The officer backed away without saying anything else.
Mowbray pressed his index finger to the cube. The portion of the metal he touched glowed an almost identical color as his fleet’s engines. After it verified who was in possession of it, the cube began displaying information across its metal sides.
The Vonnegan ruler read one side of the cube, then turned it over so new information would appear. On the cube’s second side, Mowbray’s thin black eyebrows rose.
His first instinct was to call the officer back over and ask if this information had been verified by a second source. But of course it had; it wouldn’t be included in the intelligence report unless at least two sources had provided the same account.
His second instinct was to call a meeting of his top generals. He had just read a report that Edsall Dark was going to be evacuated. Another report said that Vere CasterLan had managed to free the Excalibur Armada.
His brows furrowed as he assessed the news. The primary planet of the CasterLan Kingdom was being evacuated? A fabled collection of ships that no other ruler had been able to retrieve had been freed?
“It has to be misinformation,” he mumbled to himself. “They are scared, trying to make us change our minds.”
A small part of him hesitated in discounting the report. If his forces were going to enter a battle with the legendary fleet, his best military strategists should discuss any possible changes to their plans.
But then he settled on the correct course of action. He changed nothing. His fleet continued ahead without any change in course, without even a discussion of what else might be prudent.
There were two reasons for Mowbray’s decision. The most important was that he didn’t believe the report. He had spies everywhere in Vere’s kingdom, just as he was sure she had in his. He was presumed that some of his spies had been double agents, pretending to betray everyone on Edsall Dark by providing information to the enemy, but actually still working for Vere by providing false reports. If that was the case, having one of these double agents say that she was now in possession of the Excalibur Armada would be the best way to make him rethink his plans. No ruler, not even Mowbray, would dare go against nearly one thousand indestructible ships.
What was more plausible, that she freed the ships that had been encased in rock for thousands of years or that two spies on his payroll were still loyal to the CasterLan Kingdom?
He signaled for the intelligence officer to return to his side.
“Yes, My Lord?”
“Find the two sources who provided this information and have them killed.”
“Yes, My Lord.”
The officer disappeared without needing to be told anything else.
That would teach his spies to send him misinformation, Mowbray thought.
Almost as influential in his decision-making was a second realization: Even if Vere had somehow set loose the mythical ships, it didn’t make any difference. His fleet was only two days away from her kingdom. She wouldn’t have time to figure out how to pilot the ancient ships. It wasn’t as if the controls would be conveniently written in Basic for her crews to understand. They would get aboard and have no idea how to operate the navigation system or the weapons systems. Even if she could offer quic
k training, she wouldn’t have the time to gather enough people to man each ship. He knew from previous intelligence reports that all of her best flight crews were aboard the Solar Carriers that were amassed above Dela Turkomann. There simply wasn’t anyone around to pilot the newly available ships.
But of course that was assuming the report was true, which he still didn’t believe.
63
Pirates were the scum of the galaxy.
For all of their faults, warlords at least did their best to carry on as if they had legitimate kingdoms. They had laws. They collected taxes. These things gave them an air of legitimacy, made them appear to be almost a king or emperor or whatever it was they pretended to be.
Even gangsters had a code of conduct. The majority of gangsters in the galaxy belonged to one of the confederations or syndicates found in each solar system. They paid dues. They claimed to have ideals about personal property and about their rightful claims on booty.
Pirates had none of this. They were predators. Vermin. They were like rodents, picking apart dead animals and spreading disease as they went. Pirates stole from everyone they could find—as long as the intended victims appeared to be weaker. A superior force was left alone. An inferior force fell victim and had everything, even their ships, stolen from them. If someone was stuck in space with an inoperable craft, it was only a matter of time until pirates swooped in, killing the pilot and taking his ship. They didn’t bother to spare women or children. They even preyed on each other. They had no ethics, no code, no guiding set of principles.
It was no surprise, then, that the first pirates to see the Griffin Fire were so greedy they decided to steal it in addition to plundering the Excalibur Armada. What Vere hadn’t counted on when she was getting the Griffin Fire into motion so she could defend herself was just how many pirates would descend on the newly freed ships in a matter of minutes.
She had used the Griffin Fire’s blasters to destroy the Burst-3 Strain Frigate that had first come upon them, taking pleasure in permanently erasing the pirates who had tried to leave her and her friends without a ship. Even without proton torpedoes at her disposal, the Griffin Fire was up to the challenge of facing an outdated frigate. Her ship’s cannons were more than sufficient to take out the poorly maintained vessel.
As she and Traskk watched from the Griffin Fire’s cockpit, the pirate vessel drifted toward an Excalibur ship, a trail of black smoke lingering behind it. If the pirates aboard the vessel were still alive, they weren’t going to be for long. Traskk saw what was going to happen the same time as Vere. She was already pulling up on the nav systems when he growled a warning.
“Getting us out of here,” she said through gritted teeth.
A moment later, the frigate wandered into the side of one of the Excalibur Armada vessels. The front of the pirate ship crumbled against the newly freed ship. The Excalibur vessel didn’t even have a dent as it was impacted. A moment later, though, a sensor inside the ship, detecting metal trying to penetrate it, set off its self-destruct explosion. A blast of energy erupted in all directions. The pirate ship was vaporized. Anything in the area, other than the other Excalibur ships, would have suffered the same fate. The Griffin Fire looped around the perimeter of the fleet, safe from the blast.
“That’s wasn’t too bad,” Vere said, nodding toward where the pirates had been sent to their fate. “I would have expected more—”
The Griffin Fire’s alarms sounded. Traskk rolled his eyes as if to say “you jinxed us.”
The next pirate ships were already coming to collect the most prized treasure in the galaxy. Rather than attack her, though, the three approaching modified frigates all remained on the far side of the collection of ships.
Traskk hissed a question.
“They think if they stay over there, away from us, that they can each take their share of the loot.”
Traskk hissed another question.
“No,” she said, a smile spreading across her face. “You know me better than to think I’d let that happen.”
She took the Griffin Fire closer to the three ships and politely radioed to them that the Excalibur Armada had already been claimed by Vere CasterLan and the CasterLan Kingdom and that the pirates were expected to vacate the area immediately.
She had expected them to try to negotiate for what they considered to be their fair share of the loot. They might also have responded with cannon fire. However, they did neither of these things.
Instead, they turned their ships away from the Griffin Fire, released their trash and debris, then ignited a small engine burst so the trash flew toward the Griffin Fire. In outer space, this was the equivalent of someone waving the middle finger in the air or pouring a drink over someone’s head.
Vere turned and looked at Traskk to see if he had just witnessed the same thing she had seen. Offended, her copilot’s tail smacked the cockpit floor over and over again.
“The nerve of these guys.”
In retaliation, she shot one round from her ship’s cannons at the hull of the lead frigate. The ship’s heavy armor absorbed the blast without sustaining any damage; the shots were to send a message rather than to cause harm.
Instead of wasting time addressing a single vessel, the pirates immediately set about their work. The side hatch of the second ship raised. From inside, a crew of aliens in space armor exited their vessel and began drifting toward the closest Excalibur ship. Two of the aliens carried a thick bag of equipment that Vere guessed would contain a set of drills and other tools.
A pair of sensors began beeping in the cockpit. She looked down at the scanner and saw that two more ships were entering the area. Knowing Morgan and Westmoreland wouldn’t be able to send enough people and machinery to take each and every Excalibur ship, she ignored the first set of pirates.
“They’re going to blow themselves up anyway,” she told Traskk.
After having just seen proof that the Excalibur ships were still set to self-destruct, she didn’t want to be near this one when the pirates tried drilling into its side and were engulfed in the massive resulting explosion.
Sure enough, by the time she had taken the Griffin Fire to the other side of the armada, the vessel that the pirates had been trying to get inside erupted in a blast of sun-colored flames, a wave of energy passing through the rest of the ships. All traces of the three frigates were gone, as were the aliens that had tried to cut their way into the ship.
“Idiots,” Vere said, gazing at the explosion out the side of her cockpit.
The crews of two other pirate ships must have incorrectly guessed from the explosion that fighting had broken out as everyone tried to claim the armada for themselves. Without warning, both heavy-class Terror frigates opened fire on the Griffin Fire. Unlike the first pirate ships, these had a full array of cannons and ion bombs and Vere had to dive into a cluster of drifting Excalibur ships to avoid being hit by the incoming blasts. The pirates’ cannons were deflected by the Excalibur Armada’s plating, not even scorching the surface where they struck.
Another alarm. Two more ships were approaching the area from the other direction. Word travelled fast in the galaxy.
“Every pirate in the galaxy is going to be claiming a share of this fleet if help doesn’t arrive soon.”
Traskk growled in agreement.
“Is there anything I can do?” Baldwin said from the doorway to the cockpit.
Vere remembered how he had stepped behind her when the four mechs were bearing down on them.
“Just sit there and look pretty,” she said. “We’ve got this under control.”
She hit the Griffin Fire’s boosters, felt her ship burst forward with additional speed, and heard Baldwin stumble backwards, out of the doorway. Basilisk’s rarely laughed but Traskk did so at that moment.
When the next pair of ships arrived on the scene, the other two pirate ships that were already there opened fire on them and the two sides battled back and forth, using one of the Red Army ships as a protective
wall between them.
Another vessel arrived. This one had been a frigate at one time but was now so heavily modified that it didn’t resemble anything Vere would step inside of for fear that it would fall apart. She guided the Griffin Fire toward it. It turned out to be more of a cargo ship than an attack vessel, only meant to carry a crew of three or four people but able to transport thousands of tons.
Another beep. Another ship.
The Griffin Fire raced toward it. This one was a small transport. No weapons and no shields. She guessed it belonged to a bunch of kids who were skipping school to go exploring or to a couple of lovers trying to have a romantic day together. Whoever they were, as soon as they saw the laser blasts in the distance and the Griffin Fire racing toward them, the ship turned and sped away in the same direction it had come.
Another ship entered the area.
“This is getting ridiculous,” she said.
The newest ship was an Ion-Cell Mining Carrier, a large cargo ship originally meant for transporting vast quantities of spices, metals, and rare minerals from one solar system to another. Vere could see from the mismatched set of cannons along either side of the carrier that it had been hijacked by pirates long ago.
As she watched, the vessel pulled up between two of the Excalibur ships. Then a pair of teams in space armor exited the vessel, each carrying tow cables to both ancient craft.
“They’re going to try and tow two of these suckers away,” she said.
Traskk only nodded and watched the scene unfold.
Three more ships approached in tight formation, a sign that the first wave of pirates, the ones who had stumbled upon the treasure by chance, had given way to the second wave, those that had heard the news of the freed ships and were trained to take what they wanted. These were going to be organized and more up to the challenge in front of them. The sad thing was—and it showed the pirates’ innate weakness and abandon—that while it benefited the pirates to keep the status of the newly freed treasure to themselves, none of them were able to do so. They were their own worst enemy.
The Excalibur (Space Lore Book 2) Page 21