by David Weber
“Let’s not disappoint them,” Gensonne said, turning away from the aft display. The hell with more warnings. If De la Roza couldn’t figure out what to do about a light cruiser on his tail, he didn’t deserve to be commanding a scow, let alone a battlecruiser. “Missile salvo. Target the lead ship—that destroyer—and the portside heavy cruiser.”
“Not the battlecruisers?” Imbar asked.
“Like you said: surprises,” Gensonne said. “Green One is my party gift for De la Roza.” He smiled tightly. “We’re just going to unwrap it a little.”
“Yes, Sir,” Imbar said. “TO?”
“Destroyer and heavy cruiser targeted,” Clymes confirmed.
Gensonne nodded. “Your privilege, Captain. Fire when ready.”
* * *
Osterman was at her post in Phoenix’s Forward Weapons, monitoring the systems and wondering why anyone would attack the Star Kingdom, when everything went to hell.
Literal, violent, cacophonous, bloody, deadly hell.
She awoke in stages, first feeling the agony in her ribs, then the slightly less demanding pain in her left forearm, then the stink of burning fluids and insulation, then finally the hot sticky wetness on the left side of her head. A stern warning from the manual flashed into her mind—when seriously injured, refrain from moving until medical personnel have arrived and assessed your condition—and carefully opened her eyes.
The hell hadn’t been a dream or a nightmare. All around her the compartment was all twisted metal and half-melted plastic, the whole thing encased in a smoky darkness that was relieved only by red indicators and the sporadic glow of occasional emergency lights. Through the half-open hatchway she could see that the passageway outside was in the same state of chaos.
For a long moment she just stared at the devastation, one small, detached section of her mind cataloging her injuries, another slightly larger section trying to deduce what she could about Phoenix’s overall condition. She herself appeared to have some cracked ribs, with the breath-synchronized tweaks of extra pain that suggested that one or more of those jagged edges might be dangerously near a lung. Her left forearm was also broken, though her fingers were working more or less correctly. The warmth on the left side of her face seemed to be blood streaming from a gash in her scalp just above her temple.
She was a mess. But at least she was still alive.
Phoenix, for all intents and purposes, wasn’t.
Osterman hadn’t had time to get her helmet on, but she was still breathing. That meant that whatever the enemy missile had done to the ship, at least her section had remained airtight. The size of that bubble of mercy, of course, was impossible to guess.
There was power, too, at least enough to run the indicators and some of the electronics. Even as she pondered whether that meant the reactor was still functional or whether they were living on battery power she caught a hint of reflection from down the passageway that was a bit whiter than the emergency lights. That would be one of the regular lights, which didn’t feed off anything but main reactor power.
So the reactor hadn’t scrammed or been blown clear of the ship. They had air and power. A near-miss, then, with the missile detonating far enough from its target for a mission kill but not complete vaporization. Under normal circumstances, that would mean rescue was at least a possibility.
Only these circumstances were hardly normal. The level of damage strongly implied that some of the nodes had been damaged, which meant no wedge, which meant no motive power. The last time she’d checked, Phoenix’s net movement had still been away from Manticore, which meant that right now the wrecked ship was coasting farther and farther from any chance of help.
Worse, no wedge meant no defenses. Phoenix was laid bare, as helpless as it was possible for a ship to be. The first enemy that felt like throwing another missile at her would reduce her to component atoms.
Phoenix was dead. Osterman would soon follow.
But there was nothing to be gained by floating uselessly and waiting to meet her God. At the very least, she should poke around a bit and see if anyone in this section was still alive.
Pushing off the edge of the control board with one foot, she managed to snag a handhold with her right hand. She maneuvered her way out into the passageway, clamping her teeth against the pain, and began her search.
* * *
The wave of missiles from Group One had spent their fury, and inflicted their damage.
Their devastating, crushing damage.
Metzger wanted to turn her head. To look away from the displays and their neutral, antiseptic numbers and figures. To look at Admiral Locatelli, and offer whatever condolences and sympathy she could.
But she didn’t. She couldn’t. Her job was to maintain Invincible’s combat readiness, and that job required one hundred percent of her focus.
Besides, the admiral had just lost his nephew. He deserved whatever brief moment of privacy she could give him.
The private moment lasted approximately five seconds. “Damage assessment, Admiral,” McBride reported from CIC. His voice, Metzger noted, seemed unusually subdued for a man who often claimed to have no emotions. Perhaps it was her imagination. “Sphinx is gone completely—looks like her reactor containment failed. Phoenix—” This time, Metzger definitely wasn’t imagining the catch in the XO’s voice. “Phoenix is down,” he continued stolidly. “Her wedge is gone, along with most of her starboard side. Her reactor’s still functioning, but just barely. No way to know how long it’ll survive. If it goes, it’s unlikely the automatics will be able to eject it. Not with that much damage.”
“Understood,” Locatelli said. “What about her personnel?”
“No way to tell, Sir,” McBride said. “The bow…I’m sorry, sir. There’s just no way to tell if anyone survived.”
“I didn’t ask about the bow, XO,” Locatelli said tartly. “I’m interested in the status of all of her crew.”
“Yes, Sir,” McBride said. “Bridge and CIC have gone silent. No way to know if that’s transmitter failure or…lack of anyone there to talk to.”
“Keep trying,” Locatelli said. “Captain, what’s status on the rest of Aegis?”
Metzger skimmed down the latest report summary. “Swiftsure reports her ventral launcher and Number Three autocannon are out,” she said. “Bellerophon—”
“Was Swiftsure hit?” Perrow interrupted, frowning. “I thought the only missiles that got through were on Sphinx and Phoenix.”
“Swiftsure’s troubles are mechanical,” Metzger said. “Ditto for Bellerophon, whose starboard sidewall is down. Pegasus, Aquila and Libra report fully functional and combat-ready.” Or at least as functional as mere corvettes could be, which wasn’t very.
“We do with what we have,” Locatelli said. “Signal Bellerophon to move a thousand klicks negative so she can cover both us and Swiftsure.”
“What about her lost sidewall?” Perrow asked. “She may not be able to hide that.”
“I’m sure she can’t,” Locatelli agreed. “Given that, we may be able to use her as bait somewhere down the line to draw in one or more of Tamerlane’s ships.”
“Yes, Sir,” Perrow said. She didn’t sound happy with that idea, but they were in a battle for their lives and the TO was too good a tactician not to realize that Locatelli had to use every trick and tool he could get his hands on. “I’ll note that if our data is correct, Casey also lost a sidewall just before she took out Tamerlane’s other battlecruiser. He might be a little leery of moving in on a ship with the same supposed problem.”
“Even better,” Locatelli said. “Pulling them in or driving them back—whatever Bellerophon can do to break their formation could be useful. XO, keep a close eye on them. See which way they’re jumping.”
“Yes, Sir,” McBride’s voice came from the CIC speaker. “So far, nothing—missile trace!” he interrupted himself. “Missile trace, four, thirty-five hundred gees, estimated impact one hundred thirty-two seconds.”
“Got ’em,” Perrow confirmed. “Standing by countermissiles and autocannon.”
Metzger looked at the tactical. Six missiles incoming, all right.
She frowned. Group One had just fired nearly twice that many missiles in its last salvo, an attack that had taken out two of the defenders’ ships. The standard follow-up to such a devastating attack was to send out a second equally massive salvo while the enemy was still reeling.
But Tamerlane had only fired six missiles. That wasn’t even close to massive.
Could he be running short of ordnance? Maybe trying to conserve his missiles?
But that made no sense. Aegis was the only force standing between the attackers and Manticore. Tamerlane had nothing to gain by saving his missiles instead of spending them right here and now.
The man was up to something. The question was, what?
Perrow had spotted it, too. “Pretty small follow-up,” she commented uneasily.
Locatelli didn’t reply. Metzger watched as the missile traces crawled their ever-increasingly quick way toward Aegis. “Admiral?” she prompted.
“He’s goading us,” Locatelli said abruptly. “Trying to make us return fire.”
Metzger frowned. Okay, that could be what he was doing. A massive salvo would overwhelm Invincible’s telemetry and control systems, forcing her to choose between controlling her countermissiles or sending out a salvo of missiles of her own. By sending only six missiles, maybe Tamerlane was offering Aegis the chance to fire back.
But to what end? Tamerlane had already traded missiles, countermissiles, and autocannon rounds with the RMN ships. What else was he hoping to learn?
“And since he probably already knows everything about our armament that he needs to,” Locatelli continued, “it follows that he’s simply trying to get us to waste some missiles. TO, what was the final count on our practice missiles again?”
“Four, Sir,” Perrow said.
“Launch them,” Locatelli ordered. “All four, and target the battlecruiser.” He gave a little snort. “He wants us to take a shot at him. Let’s not keep the man waiting.”
* * *
“Missile trace,” Clymes called out. “Missile trace four; ETA one hundred twenty seconds.”
Gensonne smiled. Green One’s commander had taken the bait. He’d fired back at the invaders; and in so doing, he’d just wasted four precious missiles.
“All ships: cease acceleration on my mark,” he called toward his microphone. “Mark. Roll and yaw ninety-ninety on my mark. Mark.”
He shifted his attention to the tactical. The five ships of his advance force were moving precisely as ordered, in perfect synch with each other. Now, when Green One’s missiles arrived, they would find nothing to expend their energy on but a set of five impenetrable wedges. A standard enough tactic, as far as such things went.
Only Gensonne wasn’t going to play it the standard way. As soon as his ships’ turn was finished, leaving them pointed crosswise to their current vector, they would run their impellers to full acceleration, moving out of the Manticorans’ attack envelope.
And with that, he would force Locatelli into an impossible choice. He could turn aside in an attempt to chase down Gensonne, thus leaving Manticore open to Captain De la Roza’s force. Or he could hold course and face De la Roza directly, thus leaving Gensonne free to create as much havoc as he chose. Or he could split his forces and try to do both.
Gensonne rather hoped he would choose the third option. It would make the enemy so much easier to destroy.
But whatever Locatelli did, it didn’t matter. He’d already lost.
He just didn’t know it yet.
* * *
Phoenix’s bubble of mercy turned out to be larger than Osterman had feared, extending across most of the portside bow and continuing aft almost to the bridge and CIC. It was also wider, extending all the way out to Axial Three in places.
But none of it was in better shape than Forward Weapons. Most of it was much worse.
And then there were the bodies. They were everywhere: floating twisted and limp, some with clothing matted with blood, others burned instantly by burst plasma conduits, others with no visible marks at all. It wasn’t until she reached Beam Weapon Control that she finally found another living human being.
And even then, the universe had one last joke to play on her.
“About time,” Ensign Locatelli rasped as Osterman eased herself through the hatchway into the compartment. “I was starting to think the whole crew had deserted their posts.”
Despite the deadly seriousness of the situation, Osterman had to fight to keep from rolling her eyes. The kid was trying for the same kind of gallows levity his uncle was reported to have shown in the Gryphon Snarlery crisis thirty years ago. Only, as usual, he didn’t have the history or the basic chops to pull it off.
“Not unless you consider being called to a higher court or getting caught on the wrong side of a blast door as desertion, Sir,” she said. “Are you hurt?”
“I’ll live,” Locatelli said. “On second thought, probably not. How bad is it?”
“Bad enough,” Osterman said, moved by some obscure impulse to cushion her customary bluntness. “As far as I can tell, this is the only section of the ship that’s still intact. Every internal com I’ve tried is down, and, I haven’t been able to raise anyone on my uni-link.”
“Maybe that’s because your uni-link isn’t working,” Locatelli said. “I’ve been trying, too, and you obviously didn’t hear me.”
Osterman scowled. It said a lot for the foggy state of her mind that that possibility had never occurred to her. The indicator light said her uni-link was working, so it must be working. She really should have known better.
“We’ve got a couple of compartments aft that are still holding pressure,” the ensign continued, jabbing a thumb at the damage control schematic. “I haven’t been able to get through to anyone in any of them, either, but there could be damage control parties headed this way right now.”
“Maybe,” she said, unwilling to spot him the point. “Bottom line: they aren’t here now, and even if they show up we’re still defenseless and toothless. If Tamerlane decides we’re worth another missile, we’re done.”
“Maybe,” Locatelli said. “Maybe not.”
“Maybe not what?” Osterman gritted. She hated it when people went all coy and clever. “Not done?”
“Not toothless.” Locatelli pointed a finger at the status display to his left. “According to this, Phoenix’s laser is still functional.”
Osterman caught her breath, hardly noticing the extra-sharp twinge in her side. The laser was still functional? That couldn’t be right.
But the status display begged to differ. The lights and numbers did indeed show that the laser could still be fired.
If they could get it some power. If they could repair the control and firing circuits. If they could find some sensors and maneuvering jets to aim it.
And if they could find a target worth all that effort.
The first three were by no means guaranteed. But as for the fourth…
“Did you happen to notice how far away the second wave was from us when we got hit?” she asked. “I was busy monitoring the autocannon.”
“As of a couple of minutes before we were hit, they were thirty-six minutes out,” Locatelli said.
“So they’re probably around twenty-five minutes away,” Osterman said. “Looks like the capacitors have grounded, so we’re going to have to kluge some cascade relays directly into the plasma stream. Can you go get them? My left arm’s not good for much.”
“Sure,” Locatelli said. Popping his straps, he pushed himself out of the monitor station.
And as he floated up into the middle of the compartment, Osterman felt a shiver run through her. From the knee down, Locatelli’s right leg was gone, the cut end of his vac suit flapping gently as he moved.
“I figured the medics were busy, so I bandaged it myself,” the kid said. “Th
e cascade relays are in Number Six?”
“Should be, yes,” Osterman said mechanically, trying without success to tear her eyes from Locatelli’s torn leg. “I’ll head up to the line control crawlspace and see what it’ll take to get the targeting running. Meet me there. Sir.”
“Right.”
The ensign floated out of the compartment and disappeared down the passageway. Osterman shook her head sharply, the resulting jolt of pain clearing her frozen mind, and headed for the hatchway.
She’d seen accidents where men and women had lost body parts. She’d seldom seen anyone handle the situation this well. Maybe Locatelli had inherited more of his uncle’s personality, drive, and toughness than anyone had given him credit for.
More than she had given him credit for.
She headed down the passage, a surprising thread of optimism appearing through the darkness of the situation. She’d started this project as little more than a make-work job, something to keep her mind and hands busy while she waited to die. Now, suddenly, it had become something more.
Maybe—just maybe—Phoenix wasn’t yet out of the fight.
* * *
“Aspect change, Captain,” Commander Jenz reported from Thor’s CIC. “Casey is definitely rolling above us.”
“And angling negative to kill her positive momentum,” Obregad, the TO, added. “Plus she’s still working on killing her forward vector. Looks like she’s planning to come up on our rear, all right.”
“Of course she’s planning to come up on our rear,” De la Roza growled, glaring at the tactical. When Casey had first headed positive, he’d hoped Heissman was being smart and bugging out.
But no. He was clearly the kind of noble idiot who didn’t know a losing battle when he was in one. Either that, or the Manticorans had the death penalty for desertion under fire. De la Roza had worked in systems where that was the case.
Because at this point, further resistance was completely and utterly useless. The Volsungs would win, the Manticoran government would surrender, and that would be that. There wouldn’t be any wholescale nuking of the planet; no rape and pillage and looting; no cries of children, no wholescale arson, no economic collapse. The King would surrender, and life would pretty much return to usual.