Crowe stayed on bridge for the first two hours after their jump-in. When nothing happened he forced himself to go below for rest. He didn’t expect to be able to sleep, his body, however, had different ideas, and he went out like a light as soon as his head hit the pillow.
He’d ordered Hockley to wake him after a couple of hours; the good Commander creatively misinterpreted this into ‘let me sleep for at least seven hours’. He would have been annoyed about that, but he did feel a hell of a lot better for it, and nothing had been detected. But that in itself was worrying. Junction was usually a hive of activity, but even so close, the passive sensors were still registering nothing. If the station had gone dark, shutting down everything short of basic life support, it was possible, even this close, that any emissions were below Deimos’s detection threshold. But such a course of action and the discomfort that would come with it, would be an impressive display of discipline for a civilian crew.
Deimos decelerated and started to thread her way in among the great drifting lumps of ice and rock that made up the planets’ thirty kilometre thick rings. There was still no sign of any other human activity in the system. By now, the hairs on the back of Crowe neck were standing on end. He wasn’t the only one who found the sensor silence unnerving, the other officers on the bridge, were looking equally concerned. Finally, as they rounded the last asteroid, there was Junction Station. The bridge went completely silent.
"Oh Christ." Hockley said quietly
"Bridge to all hand, Battle Stations, Battle Stations." Crowe said flatly without taking his eyes off the display.
Before, them lay the shattered ruin of Junction Station. The main ring of the centrifuge was dark and motionless, an entire section had been blown away. Great gashes had been torn in the storage and work areas, exposing the interior. Out beyond the station, one of Junction’s harvesters lay smashed against an asteroid.
"Skipper, all sections report closed up and ready." Hockley reported.
"Understood. Helm can we come around?" Crowe asked.
"Negative, Skipper." The helmsman replied. "We haven’t got enough room to make a turn here. We need to move forward at least twelve kilometres."
"You’re planning to leave, sir?" Hockley asked.
"I think it’s fair to say the Nameless have been here Commander, would you not agree. This zone is hot." Crowe replied.
"Been, sir, past tense." Hockley said. "We’ve seen no sign of them, even if they are here, we’re safe in here. We can complete our mission, a couple of the fuel tanks look to be okay."
Crowe’s fingers drummed on the armrest of his chair.
"There might be survivors still in there, sir, not all sections appear to be breached." Hockley added. "This can’t have happen more than a day or two ago, anyone that got into a survival suit might be still alive."
Crowe flicked on the intercom.
"Bridge to Fire Control."
"Fire Control here." Came the gunnery officer’s voice.
"Guns, how do you fancy our chances if we’re engaged in here?" He asked.
"Respectfully, sir, if they take us on in here, we’ll kick seven kinds of snot out of them." The gunner replied confidently. "Maximum engagement range in any direction is barely twenty clicks; first alien that sticks its nose out into the open, is gonna get it ripped off."
Crowe suppressed a sigh. It wasn’t that long ago his officers barely spoke to him. Somehow that seemed better now than it had then.
"It’ll be out in the open they’d want to take us on, when we’re heading for the Red Line." Hockley added.
"And we have to do that to get out of here, no matter what we do. Damn that bloody fool Lukeman" Crowe said half to himself. "Damn it, all right, Helm take us in, put us in the middle of this open area, and turn us around. Commander, I want two teams, one to sweep Junction, the other to check the contents of the undamaged tanks. Issue both teams with side arms."
___________________________
The thrusters in the nose fired in a series of controlled bursts, slowing the shuttle’s velocity to less than one metre per second. A slow roll, brought the docking port into alignment with one of Junctions main airlocks. Gently, it settled into place.
"We have hard lock, seal is showing green, Bosun." Reported the shuttle co-pilot.
"Do you know if there’s pressure behind that lock?" Benson asked.
"No reading, nothing at all, station mainframe must be down."
Benson nodded, before turning and pulling himself back into the passenger compartment. The other four members of his search party, were suited up and ready.
"We have no readings beyond the lock folks, so visors down." He told them. "You can load your guns, but if anyone blows a hole in a survivor, I will not be happy and I will share that unhappiness. We all clear?"
They all murmured affirmatives. He looked back into the shuttle cockpit.
"We’re going to use a password, if anyone tries to get in without it, break contact and head back to the ship for instructions."
“Stand off from the lock until we call you back.”
“Understood.”
The passageway beyond the airlock was almost completely dark, only the occasional glow tab provided any illumination at all. Benson tapped his external pressure gauge. He then looked down the passageway, fifty metres away a pressure hatch hung half torn from its hinges, beyond asteroids were visible through a rip in the hull. Everywhere shattered equipment hung from mounts or drifted free.
"Shuttle, we’ve got hard vacuum in here, we’re carrying on, over." He reported
"Roger that, shore party, shuttle over and out."
He bounced back and forth, from wall to wall, making steady progress down the corridor. The rest of the party strung out behind him.
They headed for the station command centre in the centrifuge, on route, they passed through the station accommodation block and they found their first body.
The section was unpressurised, in a state of deep cold; the body was that of a young woman, barely into her twenties. She was drifting in the middle of the passageway, barring their path. Her clothes were the bright colours favoured by the residents of Junction, they now drifted around her. She had been quite an attractive girl, now her face was twisted horribly by pain and terror. There was no visible wound, nothing to indicate that she had died easily. Crystals of frozen blood, floated in front of her like tears.
Benson brought himself to a halt in front of her. After a minute one of the others tapped him on the shoulder.
"Bos, you all right?"
"You know something," Benson replied quietly, "the last time I saw a body like this, it was a centaur. Now it’s a girl. What the hell did they even come here for? This isn’t a military base, just families that we didn’t protect. Oh God… I wonder, will they give the bastard that did this, a medal for his ‘victory’."
"We couldn’t protect them. Bos, we have to move on."
"Yeah, nothing to see here." Benson replied bitterly, before he gripped her gently round the waist and moved her to one side.
"I’m sorry." He mouthed to the corpse.
In turn each one of them pulled themselves round the body and carried on. Benson lingered for a moment, looking back at what had been a human, before turning his back on her.
Several times they were forced to backtrack, when they found their route blocked by wreckage. Finally, they successfully worked their way to the command centre, but there were no answers there. The entire chamber had been gutted, every piece of equipment had been unbolted and removed. There was a gaping hole where a piece of the outer hull had been sliced away; in the distance Benson could see Deimos.
"This place must have been pay dirt for them." One of the men said. "A chance to get a look at our tech, without anyone shooting at them."
"Yeah, and a chance to look at us." Someone else said. "Poor bastards, they’re probably being dissec-"
"Shut your mouth. Now!" Benson snarled. "We’re going to sweep this plac
e, one deck at a time." His voice shook with emotion. "If there is even one person still alive here, we’re going to find them, find them and save them."
So, slowly, they made their way down, deck by deck, shining their torches down each passageway. Every so often they came across a floating corpse, like the first killed by depressurisation. But, even at a rough count, hundreds of Junction’s population were missing. Finally, they reached the lowest storage level of the station.
The chamber was large, mostly filled with mag-clamped storage containers. By this stage, Benson was tired, more than tired, he was heartsick. Despite the lack of air, the station had a stench, one of bad death and failure.
"Bosun," Benson looked towards the speaker. The rating tapped the air gauge of his suit. "Coming up on turn back."
It was something he should have been keeping an eye on.
"We’ll finish this section." Replied Benson as he pulled himself round another set of boxes. "How many did we find? Anyone keep a count?"
"Thirty three."
"Thirty five." Said someone else.
"They were mostly in out-of-the-way places." A third voice offered.
"They were the ones that hid." Benson said half to himself. "Then the Nameless blew holes in the station and out went the air."
He turned another corner, his torch lit up another four floating bodies. By this stage the ghostly forms, had long since lost their power to shock. But, never the less, Benson’s curiosity was stirred, it was the first group of bodies. It was a family he realised, Mum, Dad and two nearly grown children. He stopped, unable to go forward. He looked around to one of the others.
"Check them." He said in a tired voice.
The two adults were dead, there was still a tiny amount of air in their tanks, but the carbon dioxide scrubbers of their suits had been removed: they’d chosen their own way out. The bodies of the two teenagers, were equally still. Sickened Benson turned back towards the exit hatch, motioning one of the others to check them. He rested his head against a storage crate and closed his eyes; in one day he’d seen enough bodies to last a lifetime.
"Bosun! One of them is still alive!"
___________________________
The last survivor of Junction Station lay in Deimos’s sickbay, breathing slowly.
"How is she even still alive?" Crowe asked from the foot of the cot.
The ships surgeon fussed with the monitoring equipment hooked up to her, before answering.
"She was drugged to the eyeballs, Captain." He replied not taking his eyes off his patient. "I don’t know whether it was deliberate, but she was put into a very rough chemical hibernation, without the benefit of an escape pods support systems."
"Is that even possible?" Crowe asked surprised.
"Not really, but what they did manage was to drop her respiration rate right down. That stretched out her air long enough for the Bosun to find her."
Crowe glanced towards Benson, the Bosun was also in sickbay, standing in one corner. He’d barely allowed the child out of his sight since they brought her aboard. The man looked haunted, he barely blinked as he watched her. All of the boarding party had looked shaken when they came back on board, but the Bosun was clearly the worst affected. When he’d asked for a report, the Bosun had simply shook his head, and said ‘it was bad’. Crowe didn’t press the matter, for the time being it could wait.
"What’s her prognosis?" Crowe asked.
"Not so good. Proper chemical hibernation, is a hell of an assault on the body, even at the best of times. This was a strictly amateurs hour affair. Best I can hope for, is keep her stable, until we can hand her over to specialists." The surgeon glanced towards the Bosun, and lowered his voice. "She might never recover consciousness, even if she does, she’ll suffer major health problems, probably for the rest of her life."
"Alright, we’ll leave you to it doctor." Crowe headed for the hatch and paused beside Benson. "You did well to find her, but now I need you in engineering."
"Yes, sir." Benson whispered without taking his eyes off the patient.
Back on the bridge, Crowe watched as Junction station receded into the distance, and finally disappeared behind an asteroid. He considered opening fire on the station, destroying what the Nameless had left. There were good solid military reasons for destroying the station, and just as many for leaving it. None of them mattered a jot. This was a place of the dead, and needed to be respected.
Deimos cleared the planets rings, and started to make her way towards the red line. The mood aboard ship was sombre, the boarding party had talked about what they had seen aboard Junction. Crowe knew that he would have to make a statement to his crew, try to channel what his people were feeling into anger, something that would sustain them the next time they went into action.
Crowe and Hockley were talking quietly at the rear of the bridge.
"Well sir, at least we got the fuel." Hockley commented after a moment of silence.
"Yes." Crowe replied staring into the middle distance.
"What are you thinking, sir?"
"Nothing good Commander." Crowe shook his head. "They’ve overhauled us, passed us by; I just wonder, how far ahead they’ve got."
"It can’t be that far. We lost days moving off and on the commercial corridor. They’re perhaps only a day or two ahead of us."
"Maybe. But we’re going to lose another couple of days getting back to Colossus." Crowe replied. "Damn it James, they’re making a drive for Earth, and we’re out of the loop. If we’d carried on, Deimos might have got back in time to join the Home Fleet. Instead we’re still pratting around out here."
"No saying we would have got back in time, sir, and we have salvaged Colossus." Hockley mildly objected.
"I’m sure the breakers yard-"
"Captain!" The sensors operators shout cut across the bridge. "We’re getting a download from the sensor drone we dropped! It’s detected ships re-entering realspace, they’ve done it inside the mass shadow, sir. Bearing zero, two, one dash zero, three, three. They’re moving to intercept us."
"Sensors, put the feed on the main holo!" Hockley called out, "What is the transmission time lag?"
"Six and half seconds, sir. "
"Battle stations." Crowe snapped as he threw himself into his chair.
"Skipper! Thermal spike, they’re preparing to fire!"
"All sections report closed up for action." Hockley called out.
On the main display six contacts appeared, all arrayed in a line.
"Navigation, can we outrun them?" Crowe asked his voice even.
"Negative that, sir, they have too much velocity on us. They’re going to overhaul us, even on full burn."
"Sensors, do you have an estimation on strength?" Crowe continued in the same calm voice.
"I’m calling it four escorts, two cruisers, one cap ship, sir."
We’re out of our weight class, we’re outgunned and deep inside a mass shadow, Crowe thought. Even if we could outrun them, they can use their Jump Drives to cut us off. We’re trapped.
Chapter Ten
On the Eve of Battle
30th July 2066
The sheet of armour slowly drifted across the silence of interplanetary space. For the briefest of moments, four quick flashes of light lit its surface. Then the darkness returned, as the metal continued its destination-less journey
On the bridge of the Hood, Commander Willis vented her frustration pounding the armrests of her command chair.
"God damn it! For Christ’s sake, Chief! The safest place, is in front of the damn target!" Commander Faith Willis snapped down the intercom, as the latest salvo of plasma bolts whizzed harmlessly past their indifferent target.
"I know Ma’am, I’m sorry. we’ll try another set of adjustments." came back Guinness’s unhappy voice.
"Captain, signal from Hurricane. They’re asking how much longer we’re going to be." Called out the signal officer nerviously.
Willis let out a hiss of irritation, all around
her officers and rating suddenly became incredibly focused on their duties, as they attempted to avoid the attention of their fuming CO.
Two days ago the cruisers Hood, Hurricane, Tempest, Whirlwind and Onslaught had been officially put on fleet strength and designated Cruiser Squadron Eighteen. Their crews had immediately nicknamed them The Geriatrics. However despite her age, Hoods first set of engine tests had gone surprisingly well. All the engines fired on the first attempt, and nothing fell off. For a few heady hours, Willis actually started feeling good about her elderly command. Guinness had been almost swollen with pride, as Hood broke Luna orbit and headed for the rendezvous with the rest of the Home Fleet. There were still a lot of systems they still hadn’t checked, but with the engines running so well, Willis had been hopeful that everything else would fall into place equally easily. Which made the current live fire exercise all the more frightening a wake up call.
The target was a six metre by six metre section of metal plate, moving along a fixed trajectory at a velocity of twenty metres per second, currently at a range of twenty thousand kilometres. By space combat standards, it should have been like shooting fish in a barrel. So far Hood had racked up a one hundred percent record for inaccuracy.
The guns themselves weren’t the problem. Twelve years ago, Hood had received an upgrade to much of her electronics package. Since even at that stage it was already inconceivable that she would see action again, that upgrade had unfortunately not extended to her fire control computer. What Willis and Guinness had belatedly come to realise, was that this meant their weapon controls had never been properly integrated with the newer systems, such as the radar. That left Guinness now frantically trying to mate two systems, that belonged to entirely separate electronic generations. All the while the rest of the Geriatrics, waited impatiently for Hood to finish so they could take their turn.
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