“You’re tougher than you look.” Graves cracked half a smile. “If I can show my men the proof it’ll be easier. Baron, how about three hours to repair your ship?”
“Enough to get her into fighting shape, but she will need a space dock to be her old self again,” he stated.
“You have your three,” the Commodore replied. “Now, let’s talk strategy—”
“I think I have an idea about how to neutralize the Laocoon battle group,” Meia said.
Commodore Graves gave her a stern look and waited.
“There are a few of Solus’ crew that knew about Siren, but the majority of them have no idea what they’ve been doing. Let’s show them the truth too. Maybe we can get Solus and the rest relieved of command and the battle group under you,” she said.
“How do we get into a position to broadcast on the Laocoon’s network. With the jamming field they’re putting out it would have to be the laser comm. As you know that’s an isolated system controllable only from within the individual ships to prevent hostiles like us from hijacking it.”
“We’ll have to get on board,” she responded, feeling her palms grow sweaty beneath the armacorium. “Iapetus and me, I mean. The rest of you should be after Nero. This is my responsibility, my revenge.”
Graves gave her a long look, but her eyes softened.
“Meia, that sounds like suicide. They tried to kill you before,” Kae said.
“It isn’t impossible,” Graves stated. “I can smuggle you and whoever Iapetus is aboard with a shuttle. After that, though, you’ll be on your own.”
“He’s my companion. Ah, a good soldier. He’s below decks…” Her heart was pounding so hard she felt it in her throat. She had little illusions about what this would mean for her and Iapetus. Even if they made it to the comm without being detected, once they sent out the message they would be isolated and caught. Solus would kill her, but having his crew turn against him might be revenge enough even if she couldn’t manage to kill him in the process.
“I’ll take the chance,” she said.
Commodore Graves nodded.
“And who’s going to fly this ship?” Kae asked.
“You will. I’m sending you the codes and instructions now.” She connected their implants.
“Shit,” he muttered.
“I can supply you with an advantage for your mission,” Baron Mitsugawa said, startling her. “It might give you the edge you will need to succeed.”
“Thank you, I’ll take all the help I can get.” She bowed her head to him.
“Then it’s settled,” Commodore Graves stated. “Now tell me, Agent Khepria, how close you will need to be to make transmission of that worm of yours effective.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Revenant Tower, Ikuzlu, Kosfanter
J2400:3326
Cylus gritted his teeth, watching in real time thanks to the network of surveillance satellites in orbit, as the Kageryū was hit over and over again by the cruisers from the Laocoon and the Orion. He shuddered as the hologram brightened and a whole section of one of her two rings was blown to atoms.
“Your move, daughter, or was that all you had?” Zalor’s eyes gleamed.
Her jaw pulsed and she ground her teeth, but Sophi’s eyes remained on the image hovering above the desk. The Kageryū returned fire over and over again, disabling two of the cruisers before taking another bad hit on her flank. Watching the glowing dots streaming from the image’s side sent Cylus’ stomach plummeting to his feet. He wasn’t sure he wanted Sophi to win, but given that Zalor intended him to be the patsy for the Siren attack, he was sure he didn’t want Zalor coming out ahead. There was also the surprise the LeRoux offspring mentioned when they restrained him. He was still waiting for it while they continued to hold him in place.
Another flash drew his attention back to the display. The Kageryū was turning, her main engines coming online and flaring with a burn that started her accelerating out of orbit. The display showed the stars ahead of her warping into a bubble-like formation before the large ship fell in and vanished.
Cylus’ heart skipped a beat. Was that it? The surprise? He looked at each of the LeRouxs in turn but their expressions were neutral. He sighed, preparing himself for whatever horror Zalor would unleash next. The baron was now free to kill the denizens of Ikuzlu—his citizens—without resistance.
“Looks like your allies are running.” Zalor chuckled. “I guess that’s that.”
“They couldn’t take the heat,” Helena added with a wink.
“Don’t be so quick to judge, I’m not done yet.” Sophi said.
“I can’t wait.” Zalor was interrupted by a beeping in his desk. He waved his hand over it and the display shifted, zooming out to show the exit zone of the system where the Kageryū reappeared.
Normally such an image would already be four hours old due to the limits of the speed of light, but the q-comms the surveillance satellites used throughout the system allowed for near real-time updates. They were able to see the black ship, wounded but still kicking, approach the CSS Orion and assume an orbit around it.
“Why aren’t they crashing into each other? I thought capital ships couldn’t get so close,” Helena asked into the hush that fell over the room.
“The Kageryū uses a different power source than a standard capital ship. Her mass is such she can approach planetary bodies. It is why she was able to hang over our heads,” Sophi explained in a condescending tone.
Helena made a face at her.
Zalor scowled. “What are they doing? Why aren’t they shooting?”
LeRoux stroked his chin. Was that a hint of a smile on his face? Cylus couldn’t be sure.
“Tell them to blast it out of the stars.” Helena said.
Zalor pressed a button on his desk, then frowned.
“The Orion’s q-comm is not responding.”
Was that the surprise? Cylus looked at the siblings again only to find they appeared just as shocked as Zalor.
The terminal beeped again. Another ship arrived on the scene.
“What’s that?” Helena asked.
He knew the moment the display zoomed in. It was the Fukuro—which he thought was still on the roof of his tower. Only Reika had access to it. Was she on board? He watched with a fluttering gut as the ship also assumed an orbit around the Orion. Was this part of Sophi’s plan?
“Father,” Sophi said in a low voice. “You’re looking in the wrong place.”
He frowned, then zoomed the display out with a wave of his hand. The exit zone lit up with blue dots.
Cylus didn’t know what that meant, but he did know the look in Zalor’s eyes; fear.
With a frantic wave Zalor zoomed in on the new arrivals. The dots blossomed into large, cocoon-like ships with seven lobes streaking down their hulls. They were smaller than either the Laocoon or the Orion, but larger than their cruiser escorts.
“Cleebian battle-cruisers.” Bahu tilted her teardrop head to the side.
Sophi looked over her shoulder at him. “I guess we should’ve looked harder for Baron Xitar, eh?”
“You knew he would return with them,” Cylus responded with a chill running down his back. “Did you intercept his communications?”
“Yes.” She turned to her father. “And I made a deal.”
Cylus dry swallowed, knowing perfectly well that such a deal might not include good things for him.
“You made a deal…” Zalor stared her in the eyes.
“Two Confederate warships can take them, right?” Helena asked.
“One warship. The Orion has betrayed me.” Zalor’s cheek twitched. “Unexpected, but not entirely unanticipated.”
“Not entirely?” Sophi laughed. “Liar.”
“As you stated, I made enemies with Daedalus tonight. I believe his response has arrived.” Zalor waved his hand again and the display zoomed out and back in on the Matre. Three, clamshell-like craft were now in orbit. Each bore a long rail-like cannon on its back.
“Daedalus is a highly intelligent being, sure, maybe even more intelligent than anything that has existed before.” He brushed his hand through the air. “But it is still a machine. Its moves are determined by algorithms and predictable logic. It will move to eliminate the threats to its directives in the order of the scale of the threat. It knows the warships are under my command, and so…”
Two of the annihilators turned toward the Kageryū and the Orion and blinked off the display when their FTL drives kicked in. The third vanished a moment later, appearing on approach to the Laocoon.
“Those are your own men!” Cylus exclaimed. The vehemence of his statement caused his throat to pop and he lapsed into a coughing fit.
“No witnesses,” Bahu stated.
He looked from her to Sophi, ice flowing through his veins as he realized the VoQuana’s statement might include them. She was tight-lipped and drumming her fingertips against her crossed forearms.
Zalor wore a wicked smile. “I’m thirsty, how about some wine?”
The office door opened and a naked artificial entered carrying a tray with a carafe and six glasses.
“How do you intend to take out the Annihilators if you have no fleet left?” Cylus asked.
Zalor looked at him and smiled as his servant poured the wine.
He didn’t like that look at all.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
CSS Laocoon, Matre’s Glory System
J2400:3326
Meia gave the twins another look as they leaned in toward each other. In the confines of the C-37’s cockpit they practically squeezed her between them.
“Cut it out, for the last time,” she said. The pair of them were creepy, and she was sure they were having comm-conversations behind her back, but they were what she had. Baron Mitsugawa assured her they could get the job done, and she wondered if he wasn’t just a little out of his mind.
“Cut what out?” Enéas asked.
“Whatever you’re doing with her. I’m not going to ask you again,” she said.
“Communicating?” Europa replied.
“Yeah, or—”
The panel before her squealed.
“Holy shit.”
The twins leaned back away from her.
“Iapetus, how many ships is that?” she asked.
“Twenty Cleebian craft, one Abyssian Annihilator, one Confederate warship—our objective—and six escort craft which I calculate are the survivors of the battle with the Kageryū-maru,” he responded.
She looked down at her panel, watching the red, green, and orange dots converging on their position. Flashes outside the cockpit window pulsed like strobe lights as the three forces engaged each other. Red lines representing homing missiles and mass driver rounds spread like webs connecting the dots around them on her tactical display.
“Looks like it’s going to be a hot landing.” She gripped the holographic control stick harder. Off to her left something flashed. It was followed by another flare, and then too many to count. The same happened on her right, then above, and below. They were right in the middle of the battle.
“Signal the Laocoon that we’re coming in with an urgent message from Commodore Graves,” she said.
“Laser comm powered up,” Enéas stated. “Transmitting.”
“Will our ruse work?” Europa asked.
“The codes will all check out, I just hope they’re in the mood to open the door.” She pumped the throttle and the roar of the engines shook the ship as they were pressed back into their seats.
“Power flare bearing 0-9-1 off the bow,” Europa announced.
“The Annihilator,” Iapetus said from the bay behind them. His statement was followed by a bright flash and a corona of red and blue flame spreading among the stars like a spilled daiquiri. “That was the CSF Xag’lu; destroyed by the Annihilator’s relativity cannon.”
Meia shuddered. The realization that Daedalus could destroy a ship with a single shot left her feeling vulnerable, as though someone had suddenly stripped her down to her skin and thrown her into a tank filled with piranhas. If that thing hit the Laocoon while they were aboard all of this would be for nothing—at least from her point of view.
The console buzzed and the tactical scope flashed.
“Shit! Missile picked us up. Thirty-seconds to impact.” She watched the indicator tick down the time. “Plotting new burn course.”
“Missile impact in twenty,” Enéas said.
“Burn in three, two, one,” she responded.
A roar filled the cabin as the shuttle’s main engine kicked over. The diamond-shaped craft slammed them back into their seats as its twin turbines blasted a long stream of blue ions into space behind them. On the screen she watched the missile turn towards them and fire its engine.
“Time to intercept is now forty-seconds,” Europa announced.
“Is it self-guided?” she asked.
Europa looked over at the sensor display, glowing above its panel. “No radio signals detected.”
“Then that’s a yes.” She altered their course using the maneuvering thrusters, then checked the tactical again. “It would have to be the hard way, wouldn’t it?”
“What?” Enéas asked.
“We always have to do things the hard way.”
“We meant, ‘what do you mean?’” Europa said.
“Never mind. We’ll try the chaff first and see how smart this thing is.” She primed the shuttle’s defenses.
“Deploying countermeasures,” Enéas confirmed.
A spray of metal shards shot out from the rear of the craft and spread out into a vast field of shrapnel between them and the missile. Meia watched the orange line indicating the missile’s progress as it approached the field chanting, “blow up, blow up, blow up.”
She stared lasers at the orange line. The time to missile impact displayed as twelve-seconds.
She gritted her teeth.
The missile passed through the chaff field and kept coming.
“Fuck.” She took a deep breath, and for the briefest of moments entertained the thought that she could use the shuttle’s rail-gun turret to defend them. Unless she got incredibly lucky, by the time the missile was close enough to use the gun it would be close enough to explode and shred them with shrapnel. There was nothing else, though, except the aegis field—
Meia put the idea into motion before she realized what she was doing.
“The aegis field is charging,” Europa reported, then gave her a side-long look. “You’ve disabled the field limiter.”
“Yeah, I have an idea.” She gritted her teeth.
“If you do this wrong we’ll get part of the blast,” Europa stated.
“If we don’t do this at all we’ll get all of that missile up our ass.”
“Point. Field charge exceeding safety limit. How far past it are you going to go?” Europa asked.
“Somewhere around 180-percent,” she responded.
“Did you calculate that?” Enéas asked.
“Do you calculate how to touch a lover or do you do it by feel?” She took in a deep breath. If this didn’t work it would be a deadly shame.
“Interesting. Missile in range in five,” Europa said.
Meia made herself relax, waiting.
“Four, three, two…” her brother continued.
“Here it goes. Work you motherfucker,” she whispered, and triggered the field generator.
The ship whined, then a deep rumble shook the vessel and ended in a fading pulse. She watched the tactical monitor as it fuzzed, blinked off, then came back up. The orange line of the missile got to within one-second of detonation range, and hit the wall of expanding plasma from their overloaded aegis field.
The tactical display updated. The missile was gone.
“Yes!”
The panel beside her burst into flame.
“Shit.”
“Missile disabled,” Europa reported. “But I think we just told everyone we’re here.”
Meia licked her lips, seeing tens of drones and two attack craft turn onto intercept courses.
“Any response yet?”
“Affirmative, Laocoon asks us if we’re mad, but confirms docking permissions granted; berth 7.” Enéas gave her a thumbs-up.
“Prep for decel burn.” She tried not to think about all of the ships closing in on them. Meia lined the ship up with their target. From their vantage point it was a faint white dot in the eternal night sky.
Just ahead of them a rectangular ship with three large engines in her stern appeared out of the darkness and shot past them. She recognized it as the Karibdus, one of the Iaeptus’ sister ships. In the vastness of space, even given the battle going on, it was one in ten-million against to get this close to another ship by chance. Moments after its icon flashed and vanished from her scope, chewed apart by the Cleebian drones and attack craft.
The tactical display updated. Their attackers turned onto other courses intent on bigger prey.
“Thank you,” Meia said, breathing a sigh of relief tainted by the knowledge that her old fleet-mates had, intentional or not, just given their lives for hers. “I will avenge you—wait, don’t fire the main drive. I don’t want us getting noticed again. Prep maneuvering thrusters.”
“Calculating,” Enéas said. “We have just enough maneuvering fuel to execute this maneuver. If you make a mistake—”
“She will not,” Iapetus stated in a rumbling voice.
Enéas and Europa slapped their mouths shut and put their eyes on their terminals.
Meia hoped he was right.
“Thrusters prepped,” Europa stated.
Dots swarmed around the tactical scope. Red clashed with yellow and dots vanished. Orange lines appeared and disappeared as missiles launched, tracked their targets, and exploded.
She took a deep breath and pressed the maneuvering thrusters to their limit. She felt the force of acceleration pressing her back into her seat. A sound like a distant river filled her ears as their fuel gage started to tick down.
She watched the tactical map for any indication that they were being followed. Through the window the white dot started to grow. Within thirty seconds it grew into the long, dagger-like form of the CSS Laocoon. A cloud of debris surrounded her like a foggy halo. Flickering lights seated in blackened holes along her hull revealed where she had already taken bad hits.
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