He was running out of time.
Reaching round his back, he located the detonator on his belt and carefully unclipped it.
Although he couldn’t understand what they were saying, it was obvious that the pilot was trying to get them organised. It wouldn’t be long before they tried to rush him.
Using just his thumb, he managed to arm the detonator. Then it was just a case of pressing it.
The ground rocked as a huge explosion caught him from behind, followed by a gust of super-heated air which assaulted his ears before knocking him to the ground. He watched in awe as the fiery remains of the shuttle spiralled over his head, coming to earth a few metres away in a shower of burning fuel.
The Da’al crewmen were as stunned by the turn of events as he was with many of them visibly injured. They made no attempt to approach him, looking at him with a combination of fear and suspicion as a high pitched, susurrating sound filling the air. It built to a strange cacophony of noise as each one of them breathed out, expelling air across their vibrating mandibles.
The effect was chilling, calculated to strike terror into the hearts of their enemies and it had just that effect on Webster now. He began to doubt himself realised with a sinking feeling that he’d dropped his pistol when the shuttle had exploded.
If Nash had been there, Webster thought, he might have had a chance but, vastly out-numbered as he was, his position was looking increasingly perilous. He’d always been taught that a tactical withdrawal was preferable in a situation like this but he also knew that if he allowed that other shuttle to get airborne, it would mark the end for Markham and the others.
But it was looking more and more likely that he wasn’t going to get a say in the matter. He was going to have to play out this hand with the cards he’d been dealt.
Nervously, Webster reached behind his back hoping to find the second detonator attached to his belt. Only it wasn’t there.
He ran his fingers along the inside of the belt. It had to be there.
Then he saw it, lying on the ground over towards the six o’clock shuttle. It must have worked its way free when he’d been wrestling with the pilot.
By this time, a crowd had gathered at the rear of the main camp, eyeing the twisted carcass of the shuttle. All the while, others were flooding out to join them. Their attention naturally shifted across in his direction, prompting a chorus of clicking and buzzing as they surveyed the stranger in their midst. Their clicking now accompanied by spasmodic arm movements every bit as meaningful as the sounds they were making.
They quickly began fanning out on two sides, as they attempted to take him in a pincer movement. Interestingly, no weapons were proffered, they were clearly intended on taking him alive.
Webster’s natural urge was to retreat in the direction of the camp perimeter but he needed to factor in that detonator. It was three metres away to his immediate left. If he moved quickly enough…
He briefly considered raising his hands as a sign of surrender in the hope of getting them to drop their guard but he quickly decided against it. With no concept of human body language, the gesture would prove meaningless.
Instead, he dropped down onto all fours in a bid not to alarm them, and simply scurried across like a demented crab. That way he was able to quickly retrieve the detonator. Once he had hold of it, he came quickly upright, only to crash into a Da’al soldier which had been creeping up on him from the rear.
Seeing it up close gave him a real fright and he spun around, attempting to push it away. But the thing had got a hold of his sleeve and so clung on, chattering wildly into his ear. For all his efforts, he found it impossible to shake the creature off but then he realised that he didn’t have to. Bringing up his elbow to buy himself some time, he switched his focus to the detonator.
He twisted the detonator’s dial - effectively arming it – and then thumbed the button.
There was a moment’s pause, in which he became aware of the two groups approaching, followed by an enormous flash of light. The next thing he knew, he was flying through the air. He cracked his head on the ice as he landed and he must have lost consciousness then because the next he knew he was lying on the floor with his clothes on fire.
Without even thinking, he began rolling backwards and forwards across the ice. When he was certain the flames had been extinguished, he sat up and checked himself. The soldier who’d grabbed him was lying face down, the back of his skull torn open, but then there were bodies literally all over the place. Everywhere he looked he saw sections of broken and cracked carapaces. Some of them still burning.
There were one or two Da’al still standing but they were moving about erratically making a horrible chittering sound. As far as he could make out, they posed no immediate threat to him.
When he tried to get up his head started to swim so he had to kneel down until he could get his bearings. He focussed on the ground directly in front of him, waiting for the ringing in his ears to subside but when it didn’t he decided he was just going to have to move. Only, before he could do so, his eyes shifted onto something that looked familiar. The handle of his pistol was sticking out from underneath a section of engine casing.
The engine casing was hotter than it looked and he burnt his fingers, but not before he managed to reclaim his side arm.
The shuttle skeleton was still ablaze and he couldn’t get too close because of the ferocity of the heat so he had to scout around it. Miraculously, the bag of detonators was where he’d left it and he picked it up and slung it over his shoulder.
One more job to do, one more shuttle to destroy and he’d be finished.
But that all changed when he saw the sorry creature hunched against the side of the shuttle. Its uniform was covered in scorch marks but, other than that, it didn’t appear to be wounded. But it was the uniform which caught his attention.
It was a different colour to that of the other ground crew.
That was when he made the connection. It was wearing the same uniform as the pilot who’d attacked him earlier: brown with black patches. It even had the same type of lattice work head set.
That gave him an idea.
He grabbed hold of the front of its uniform and pulled the thing to his feet. Its mandibles started to vibrate and it made a kind of yelping noise, more panicky than aggressive. But Webster was tired. He’d had enough.
He raised his pistol levelling it up with one of their containers and put two shots in the side. That appeared to get his message across.
He pointed the pistol at the cockpit and inclined his head. Something in the Da’al’s eyes registered acknowledgement.
The creature appeared to be having difficulty breathing, there were two sacs below its mouth section which kept inflating and deflating wildly but after a while they calmed down. The creature led him aft and they entered through the main ramp, the creature’s eyes never leaving him for a second. The unlikely pair made their way to the forward cockpit. The pilot settled itself in one crash couch while Webster occupied the other.
Webster motioned upwards with his pistol and the pilot started the engines.
The whole front of the ship suddenly tipped forward, as if swinging on a pivot and Webster had to throw his hands forward to stop himself being thrown from his seat. He wasn’t sure whether that had been deliberate or whether the pilot was just frightened but he started to relax as the craft lifted straight into the air. A black ball of smoke rose up into the air from the still burning shuttle, obscuring Webster’s view of the camp.
What he was aware of was all the activity on the ground as the Da’al came to terms with their losses. It would be some time before they were in any kind of position to go after Markham and the others.
Webster tapped the pilot on the arm to get his attention then pointed him in an easterly direction.
“Let’s go and see how Mr Nash is doing.”
CHAPTER FORTY
The Da’al ship had beaten them to Laxx with several hours to spare but had res
olutely failed to place itself in orbit, preferring instead to take up a position roughly seven hundred thousand kilometres distant.
Ardent knew little about space warfare but even she could see how this was a clever move on their part. If the Da’al ship, which they had recently christened Loki, had entered orbit then it would have been able to menace the planet from a position of strength but in so doing would have left itself exposed to any oncoming threats from the Renheim. This way, the ship maintained its defensive priorities while still being well placed to neutralise any ships coming up from the surface.
The one downside to this was that it couldn’t maintain line of sight with Laxx’s orbital station when it disappeared around the other side of the planet.
Still, if it chose to do so, it could destroy the miners’ ships with impunity. The act of a true predator.
That left the Renheim as the lead ship with only The Sundowner and the Molly Maguire as back up. Winterson in the Naked Spur, was sticking to his original plan of setting up a defensive line further out in the hope of facing down the remaining Da’al ships. He had seven other ships in total, with Blackbeard and Defiant counted among their number.
“How do you intend to proceed, captain?” she asked.
Meyer was standing behind her but she didn’t need to be able to see his face to know how he’d react to such a question.
They were at the sharp end now, the tip of the spear, a position which Meyer had assiduously avoided all his working life. He had only ever operated in peacetime and had so far managed to play down his obvious shortcomings as a commander while all the time exaggerating his strengths. As a result, as far as his superiors were concerned, Meyer was the very epitome of what they would call: ‘a safe pair of hands.’
While he had never excelled in any one particular area he had likewise never experienced the slightest set-back and so his tenure on the flight deck of the Renheim had largely been adjudged to be a success. His biggest concern was always to avoid saying anything in order to avoid generating any negative feedback from the various colonies he had been tasked with patrolling. He had carefully established a reputation for being tough on smugglers and pirates. He knew the threat that his ship posed to such people and he used that to his advantage, safe in the knowledge that these much smaller vessels were never likely to pose much of a threat. Plus, if such a thing was to occur then he had a team of brave and skilled subordinates who were more than capable of dealing with such minor inconveniences.
The only time he had faced the possibility of a major engagement had been two months ago when the Anjharan Da’al had first appeared in the system and targeted Tigris. That engagement had never happened. Meyer had decided that in such circumstances discretion was the better part of valor and had run for safety. Considering how poorly the Nantucket and the Meridian had fared in the face of enemy fire, there was a case to be made that he had acted reasonably under the circumstances but this time things would be different.
With Admiral Winterson keeping his every action under close scrutiny, there was nowhere else for him to run. Meyer had been charged with taking a firm line against the Da’al, and that was what he would have to do. There could be no backing down.
Ardent knew that, despite the weaponry at his disposal, Meyer’s ship had never once fired a shot in anger. His attitude was in direct contrast to the bulk of the civilian captains who they were attempting to integrate into their command system. There were eleven in all the four main ones being: The Sundowner, Molly Maguire, Blackbeard and the Defiant.
Blackbeard was Captain Frans Jacobs’s ship. A proud Afrikaaner, he had at one time operated a huge fleet of commercial hauliers but had over the years sold most of these on. He had four other ships, two of which, the Montezuma and the Santa Cruz were accompanying them now. Jacobs was in his late 60s and a millionaire many times over but the rumours about his impending retirement were just that: rumours.
Molly Maguire was Catelyn Stark’s ship. Stark liked to keep her business shrouded in mystery and it was widely purported that she’d carry anything if the price was right. There might have been some truth in that last part as Stark had a reputation for sailing very close to the wind on occasion
All were equipped, quite legally, with defensive lasers in an attempt to counter the threat posed by pirates. Ardent didn’t doubt for a moment that on top of these purely legal armaments the ships had also been fortified with a range of highly illegal weapons which they could fall back on should the occasion require.
This kind of weaponry was hardly ever ‘discovered’ on routine inspections by USDC ships. The universe was a big place and everyone knew that it was impossible for the military to provide adequate protection for all ships at all times. So, inspectors who stumbled across caches of weapons such as this were often pragmatic enough to turn a blind eye.
Ardent reflected that such weaponry might prove to be something of a blessing under the current circumstances but the extent to which each ship was armed would have to remain a mystery to all on-board the Renheim after Meyer had handled the request for information with his usual heavy handedness. Instead of contacting the captains separately and asking for an honest appraisal he had simply sent over the usual bureaucratic request forms asking for a list of each ship’s current defensive capabilities. The captains, all being miners or working within the industry and, therefore, suspicious of bureaucracy of any description had responded in kind, offering only the most minimal details. Some hadn’t even bothered listing the weaponry they carried legally, even though the most rudimentary perusal of their ship’s super-structure would quickly highlight the truth of the matter.
And this was where Ardent felt Meyer’s management style was doomed from the start. If he couldn’t convince their allies to work with him then what chance did he have of getting this ragtag group to work against the enemy?
She moved over to the conch shell shaped console where Farnese was currently working.
“Can’t you do something about this?” she asked.
Farnese emitted a good natured growl. “Not without making the whole situation worse.”
“How do you mean?”
“Aside from going aboard and inspecting these ships ourselves there’s no way we’re going to get them to come clean.”
“I understand that,” she said lowering her voice. “But for Meyer to be effective in command he’s going to have to know what each ship is capable of: which ships can look after themselves and which ones can’t. It’s going to be an impossible job otherwise.”
Farnese cast a glance over in Meyer’s direction. “It’s an impossible job whichever way you look at it. What if the captains had been straight with him? What if they’d told him the truth from the start? What then?”
“Well, at least then we’d know what our strengths are.”
“Wrong,” Farnese insisted. “If they’d told him the truth then Meyer would have been forced to respond. As a Confederation officer, he’d have insisted that they deactivated their so-called ‘illegal’ weapons. Dump ‘em or disable ‘em. That’s what would have happened. Trust me.”
“Dump ‘em or disable ‘em,” Ardent’s voice was incredulous. “But not in these circumstances, surely?”
“For Captain Meyer, there can be no exceptions, Governor.”
“And you think that’s what he’d do?” she softened ‘he’d’ to the point where it was barely audible.
“That’s exactly what he’d do. No question,” Farnese brought up a view of their whole ragtag battle fleet. “So, it’s perhaps best if we don’t know what it is these ladies might be carrying under their skirts.”
Farnese was interrupted by a communication coming up on the main screen. It was Donald Resnik, captain of The Sundowner. It was a three hundred thousand ton cargo whose non-essential crew were now back on Iscaria.
Resnik was heavy set with a shock of red hair. A company man through and through, a lot of people had been surprised when he’d added his ship’s name to the c
onvoy. Normally, people like Resnik were risk averse: it wouldn’t do much for a captain’s career prospects if he wrote off one of his company’s largest assets.
But the company which operated The Sundowner had its main office on Laxx and that was where they recruited most of their crew from. As a result, a lot of Resnik’s people had family on the planet, so it would have been awkward for him not to get involved. Ardent, however, hadn’t been surprised when Resnik had volunteered. She’d had dealings with him in the past and knew some of his history. The man had served in the USDC during the Long War and had lost most of his ear when his ship had been attacked by a Yakutian frigate. The story went that after they’d been hit, a fireball had torn through the engine room where Resnik was on duty. He’d sustained burns to forty percent of his body and subsequently been invalided out of the navy.
To come back after something like that was impressive enough but to make a success of a second career suggested that the man had qualities which might come in useful in the days to come.
“What’s troubling you, Captain Resnik?” Meyer inquired.
The fact that he used the honorific at all was perhaps in recognition of his service record and Ardent saw that in itself as a minor victory. Initially, Meyer had refused to recognise the civilians’ rank at all, simply referring to them all as ‘Mister.’ It had caused no end of tension until Ardent had pointed out that if he wanted the civilians to respond to his requests he needed to show them an appropriate level of respect.
It was largely because of his service record that Ardent had pushed for Resnick to accompany them on their run to Laxx along with Vivian Chu on the Defiant.
Frans Jacobs had had a belly full of Meyer’s antics and had opted to accompany Admiral Winterson in setting up their forward operating position along with six other vessels.
“We’re currently having some difficulty communicating with the two shuttles,” Resnik said. “Either they can’t pick up our communications or they’re deliberately ignoring us.”
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