"I think we're going to have to talk our way out of this one, Skipper." Lenys' voice was just loud enough to be heard above the atonal wail of the alarm.
"I think you're right," he reached out and slapped the cutoff for the alarm. "I hope whoever's in charge there is in a mood to listen."
*
Jayne covered her ears the moment the alarm started. "What is that noise?"
"Threat receiver," John muttered, levering himself off his bunk. "I need to be on the bridge." He took one step towards the door before his legs buckled.
Jayne slipped off her own bunk and was beside him in a moment. His arm was a reassuring weight as she put it across her shoulder and helped him back upright. "Just point me in the right direction and I'll get you there."
Wrapping her arm around his waist she made for the door. Even in the strange garb, there was something reassuring about his presence. Something about knowing there was someone else here who she could remember from Seattle. Someone else who remembered Seattle. Someone who was proof that there was a place called Earth and that there was a connection, however tenuous.
They had almost reached the door before Jayne realized the doctor was saying something. "He's in no shape to be anywhere but sickbay, and you're not cleared for the bridge."
"I take responsibility, Crown Recognizance, now open that door." John's words came with a weight Jayne had never heard before. "I need to be on the bridge and you have to be at your station in case there's more than just a warning."
Doctor Jaren shut her mouth, then nodded in a way that made Jayne think she wanted to curtsey before speaking again. "Yes, sir, Your Highness I mean."
John nodded and Jayne helped him through the door. "Go left, it's not far." His voice was weaker now. "Sorry for dragging you in to this."
"You can pay me back later," she tried to smile as they made their way down the companionway. "But what was that about 'Crown Recognizance?' She didn't seem to be willing to let us out, but then she suddenly gave in."
"I made it an order she couldn't refuse. I took responsibility as the Crown, rather than myself." He grinned, "and I think I outrank her."
Jayne nodded and kept moving. He was heavier than he looked and for all that he had said it wasn't far the companionway looked long to her. At least they don't seem to go in for lots of ladders; I don't know how I would get him up a ladder.
The deck rocked sideways and Jayne flailed for balance, throwing her left arm wide as John's weight slammed into her side. Then the lights went out and an alarm screamed.
*
"Damage Report," Tam snapped as the ship reeled from the impact. The lights flickered and died, plunging the bridge into darkness before the emergency lights came up.
"Hammerbeam strike, looks like the engine rooom." Lenys flipped her damage control display to one of his secondary displays. "The compartment's open to space, the QAR's down, and we're on emergency power."
"Casualties?" Tam forced calmness into his voice. Even if it didn't fool anyone, it was still his job to project that air of self-control.
"Five possible, three confirmed." Lenys double-checked the display. "Thorn, Harmin and Clar. Looks like Lieutenant Deggon was off duty when it happened."
"Put her in charge of damage assessment, we need to know if we can lift for home."
"Aye sir," Lenys replied.
The sickbay link on his com panel flashed, but before he could open it the main screen flashed to an external com.
"This is Admiral Harvik Loman of the Tavrolan Sector Guard, commanding the Interdiction Force; identify yourselves and prepare for boarding. Do not resist or we will be forced to destroy you." The words "tight beam" floated on the screen below the Admiral, and some detached part of Tam noticed the majority of the bridge crew he could see were wearing Fleet Blue,with only a very few sharing their commander's colors.
The hatch behind Tam slid open, but he did not bother to turn around to see who it was immediately. Lenys had a better view of the hatch, and he saw her eyes widen in apparent surprise for just a moment.
"Commander Tam Holron, ISS Talon on detached orders from Admiral Adric Calthran, Imperial Guard." He thought he saw a reaction on the Tavrolan Admiral's face when he mentioned Calthran's name but he could not be sure. "We respectfully request assistance in repairing our vessel as we are on a mission of importance to the Imperium."
"Then why were you sneaking around rather than operating openly?"
"Orders, sir," Tam said. "This is a matter of great importance to the Imperium, and on a strictly need to know basis."
"Very well, stand by and I will send parties over, once we've examined your ship we will intern you until I can confer with my superiors. It shouldn't be more than a couple of months."
"I'm sorry Admiral, but I'm afraid I can't accept that. We are on a very important mission and cannot afford the time constraints."
The Admiral's face hardened in the monitor. "This is not a debate, Commander," he said, with obvious stress on Tam's rank. "You will do as I say, or I will destroy your vessel."
"That would be treason." A new voice came from over Tam's shoulder, and he noticed the words "tight beam" disappear from the screen. The Admiral's face flashed bright red for an instant, before hardening into an expression of cold resolve.
"Treason?" He spoke in a cold clipped voice. "I see no treason here, only criminals seeking to avoid responsibility for their actions."
"I am His Royal Highness, The Prince Jhon, Heir Presumptive to the Imperium and any attack on my ship or my person is treason." Tam turned towards the source of the voice, only to see the prince, leaning on the woman they had picked up with him. Unsteady he might have looked on his feet, but his voice was firm.
"You are no more the prince than I am," the Admiral's voice dripped cuttingly from the speakers. He leaned towards a figure off-screen. "Destroy them."
"He's powering weapons." Vidall spoke softly and Tam heard someone start to pray.
*
"Something coming in on the com, Skipper," Makar's communications officer said. "Broadcast with," she paused a moment and he heard her catch her breath, "an Imperial flag." Eron pulled his attention away from the tactical screen with its picture of a full battle squadron facing down a single destroyer.
"Patch it through." He shook his head, this exercise had already passed the point of strange. Their primary mission was to prevent anyone from getting in or out of Sol system, but even so, why had the whole force dropped out of stealth to deal with one ship. The destroyer looked half-crippled, and the cruiser that had done the job had more than enough firepower to finish the job.
"...is treason." The words pulled him into the present and he took a second look at the image on his screen. At first glance it looked like any other bridge, then he noticed that the speaker was not the one in the command chair. It was a figure in a medical gown, leaning on a woman dressed the same way. Below the image he could see the words "Imperial Priority." Makar blinked as an identification tag hit the screen beside the image. HRH Prince Jhon Confidence level 100%.
"Skipper," Haiston's voice cut across the image. "Flag's powering weapons, looks like they intend to fire on the Prince's ship."
"Take us to condition red," Makar flipped open a cover on his console and triggered a switch. "I want an alpha-strike on the flag, now, and a channel opened to the rest of the fleet."
"Aye sir."
He waited the brief moment it took for the link to open, then spoke. "Attention all ships, this is Captain Eron Makar of the Indestructible, I am relieving Admiral Loman of command of the Interdiction Force on charges of treason. You are ordered to protect the Prince, use deadly force if necessary, Makar out."
His chair shuddered as the first flight of missiles launched, then again as the hammerbeams found the range. Energy weapons weren't supposed to recoil, but hammerbeams were a special case, relying on kinetic energy, so even with the mounts shielding some got through. Battle cruisers were overgunned too, carrying he
avier beams than anything short of a superdreadnaught on a fraction of the mass.
"We're hitting her Skipper, but it's not doing enough," Haiston put a damage overlay on the tactical screen. "She hasn't fired yet, but even without her shields we won't be able to strip her before she can take down that destroyer."
"Move to interdict," Makar snapped. "If we can't stop her from firing we'll have to take the hit. I want all point defense tasked on defending the Prince. One missile hits that ship and she's gone."
"Aye sir, drive to full, but I don't think we'll make it, the geometry's wrong." Haiston turned back towards his screen. "Captain, it's the Illuminous," referring to the cruiser that had fired the first shot. "She's moving to interdict, her shields are up and she's heading between flag and the Prince."
"Gods be with her," Makar breathed as he turned his attention back to the display. The image compressed scales to fit everything on the one screen with the appropriate codes beside each ship. Most seemed to be waiting, though for what Makar had no idea. The flag's icon showed damage and weapon status and the latter was rising much faster than the other was falling. Makar tapped some icons, and a pair of cones appeared on the display, the flag's firing arc, followed by the cruiser Illuminous' shadow. Eron watched the race between the flag's weapons readiness indicator and the cruiser's shadow.
It was going to be close, luckily, Makar grimaced a little at the choice of word, the cruiser was closer to the flagship than its target, but even with that advantage it was going to be very close. If the flagship had not been at full stealth there would not have been any chance, the weapons would have been online and it would have been all over in seconds. But superdreadnaughts weren't designed for extended stealth operations, and unlike stealth specialists like Indestructible they had to shut their weapon systems all the way down to go into stealth. Not even point defense stayed active.
A flash on his display caught his attention as the first of his missiles struck home. Even without her shields a superdreadnaught was tough, built to stand up to anything short of a mauler. His hammerbeams might strip a weapon or two, catch a missile before it launched and jam the launcher, but it was the missiles that were the real killers when it came time to fight with the big boys. The damage codes told the story. All he had been able to do with hammerbeams was take out one turret and half the facing point defense clusters. As far as the destroyer was concerned, it might as well have been scratching paint for all the effect it would have on a superdreadnaught.
The missiles started scoring, anti-matter fire ripping divots out of hullmetal armor as they reached for the systems below the shell. One hit, then another, and Makar smiled in approval as his gunner started laying them one atop the other. Khrison was an artist, with the feel that let her put the second missile right on top of the first so the target felt them as one continuous blast, while still keeping them far enough apart that later missiles survived to detonate. He bared his teeth when the codes showed she was already starting to vent atmosphere.
"Come on, come on," he muttered. "Kill the sensors, shut her down." All he needed was a few more hits, he could get the mission kill and they could take the crew off that destroyer.
Then the screen went red as the flagship's systems finally came online.
"She's firing, Skipper." Khrison's words had an edge of defeat. "Looks like her firepower's down at least thirty-five percent, maybe more."
Makar's eyes glued to the screen, his imagination capturing the data and giving him a view as if he were watching a video re-creation. The flagship turning to bring as many weapons as it could to bear on the destroyer, a shark attacking a minnow. The heavy cruiser moving between the two, its drive flaring as it dumped waste heat. A shoal of missiles leaping from the superdreadnaught, hammerbeam turrets tracking, then firing, their supralight beams invisible even in Makar's mind's eye. Point defense lanced out, hammerbeams leaping from battle-cruiser and cruiser towards the superdreadnaught's deadly missiles. Suddenly the cruiser crumpled, capital hammerbeams smashing into its hull.
Sections of hull armor suddenly accelerated to near lightspeed dumping that energy back into the ship. Armor ripped and tore, smashing through the ship and sending pressure waves throughout her core. Nothing less than another superdreadnaught could expect to stand the pounding of those beams. A lightly armored cruiser, even a heavy cruiser, could not expect to stand up to even half the battering.
"She did it," Eron breathed, watching the other vessel's death throes. "She stopped the hammers, now bring us in closer, we need to be there before those weapons recycle."
Indestructible would not live up to her name if she came between the superdreadnaught and the destroyer, but she would last a lot longer than the cruiser had under those beams. The cruiser's hulk exploded, and the shadow cone dropped off the display along with its source. The battle cruiser shuddered again as her weapons fired, targeting the missiles still bearing down on the destroyer. Eron Makar frowned, something looked off, he pulled up the display again and saw it. The cruiser had not quite made it into position, the destroyer was still just past the edge of the cone.
"Her targeting's degraded." Makar barked an order. "Throw everything you can at the flag, I want every sensor she has blinded. Target priorities to match, sensors are primary targets not weapons." He looked at the full display a moment. "Haiston, what're the rest of the squadron doing?"
"Nothing yet, sir," the exec replied. "Seeing power levels coming up on a few though."
The ships closed, Makar cutting the distance as quickly as possible. They were already well inside anything the book would call battle range, now even the lasers were opening up, trying to blind sensors. Khrison cursed as the last missile got past her point defense, the main hammerbeams were still cycling and nothing on that destroyer would stop that missile. Makar tasted defeat, there was no way that ship could take even a single missile hit.
The missile crumpled in on itself, as a capital hammerbeam reduced it to scrap, the kinetic energy wrapping it around itself.
"Message from flag, sir." Commander Haiston spoke through the shock. "It's Commander Morraien, the exec and she's broadcasting on all channels."
One of the displays changed to show a woman in a smoky room, her smoke-streaked face framed in wisps of red hair. "This is Commander Evrien Morraien, acting Captain of ISS Victory, we are standing down, Admiral Loman has been confined on charges of treason, and I am placing myself and my ship under Captain Makar of the Indestructible until a new force structure is determined. Victory out."
Makar let out a long sigh then swivelled round to face his bridge crew. "All right, first thing we need to do is pull the survivors off that destroyer. Once the prince is aboard we canfigure out what to do next."
Chapter 14
Jhon coughed as he caught a lungful of smoke. The ventilators were doing their best but there was only so much they could do on emergency power. "How bad is it?"
"How bad is what?" Jayne's voice came over his shoulder, reassuring in its familiarity despite the quaver in the last word.
"The ship," the Captain's words were low but his voice carried over the background noises of a dying destroyer. "She's gone Your Highness, the QAR's floating in space, and even if it wasn't a single g would snap her in two.
"Lenys," his voice rose a little. "I need all hands ready to abandon ship, and His Highness in a suit."
"The crew needs them more than I do, and what about Jayne?" Jhon turned, his arm sweeping out towards her. "She has nothing to do with this."
"We'll do what we can for them Your Highness, but you come first." The Captain leaned in towards him. "Every single casualty will have been for nothing if we can't get you back to Altiar. The Enemy is coming and the Governor of Tavrolan sector is trying to carve up the Imperium for his own profit. If you die, he wins, and humanity loses. You are the most important human being alive, and it is our job to keep you that way.
"Do you understand me, Your Highness?"
Jhon nodded slowl
y. "Yes Captain, I do." He looked around the bridge. "I am a naval officer, I do understand duty."
"Thank you, Your Highness." The Captain grinned, his teeth bright in the grimy face. "Perhaps you had better start getting used to calling me Commander; I don't think I'll be Captain of anything for very much longer."
"Yes," Jhon paused, "Captain. I will bear that in mind."
The ship shuddered beneath them and one of the officers turned away from his console. "Captain, I don't think we need to worry about the suits. Help has arrived."
A glance at the screen that was amazingly still working showed Jhon the situation. Half a dozen big assault shuttles were lining up for docking at the one remaining lock. "Where are they coming from?"
"It looks like most of them are from the flagship, but one or two are from that battle cruiser." The officer shrugged, coughing, "it's hard to tell exactly with the systems I've got left."
"Put me on one from the battle cruiser," Jhon looked at the others. "I don't want to be on a ship that just tried to shoot at me; someone in the crew might try to finish the job."
The captain nodded grimly. "I think Your Highness might be right. Lieutenant Pirk and his men will be providing you with an escort."
"Good idea." Jhon pulled Jayne toward him. "They will be providing us with an escort."
*
Jayne watched their guards as she and Jhon followed them through the corridors of the battle cruiser. The ship was huge, over two miles long Jhon had said, and she thought they were likely to walk the whole length of it. Her feet ached, and she could only imagine how Jhon felt after the last few days. Stealing a look at him, she wondered how he was managing it. Back on the destroyer he had been leaning on her shoulder with every step, now he was ahead of her and standing on his own. He was walking slowly, but without help. The slowness seemed to lend a certain dignity.
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