by gerald hall
“Sir, they are turning around and heading towards us.” Brandon announced.
“Does it look like they are preparing to surrender?” Alec asked.
The tone in Brandon’s voice suddenly got a lot more excited as he looked at the changing information on the enemy assault shuttle.
“No, Sir. They are accelerating and appear to be on a collision course with us.”
“Everyone open fire on that Tiger. She must be stopped, one way or another.” Alec immediately ordered to all of his subordinate captains and fighter pilots.
At the same time, Ethan turned Alacrity away and accelerated to open the range while the jump tender’s own weapons opened fire on the rapidly closing Tiger.
Alec and the others on Alacrity’s bridge could see showers of armor and external components trailing behind the Tiger with every hit scored upon her. The Tiger fired back at her tormentors but did not waste any energy attempting to avoid the mass of weapons fire aimed at her. Her captain and crew were determined to close with and destroy Alacrity, who they saw as the ultimate engine of their unit’s destruction.
“Got him!” Yelled Colin immediately after one of the heavy projectiles fired from his Archer’s spinal-mounted bass driver struck deep within the Tiger’s engineering section. Immediately, her maneuver drives began to falter as her engine exhausts faded into darkness. Fire from the Tiger’s weapons also ceased as well due to an apparent loss of power.
Alec then repeated his call for the Tiger’s crew to surrender. Receiving no response, Alec sent a message to Justin instructing him to prepare to board the Tiger.
“I wouldn’t do that, Sir.” Angela quickly said, still watching from the bridge along with Jonathan.
“Why do you say that, Angela?” Alec asked.
“Because I know those people on that ship. Even if you were able reach her to board, they would not go down without taking as many of us with them as possible. Those people included the rest of those cyborg fanatics as well. They are planning on committing suicide, Sir. In fact, it is my opinion that they are preparing to detonate their fusion power plant as soon as one or more of our battlers get close enough to also be destroyed in the blast.”
“So what do you suggest?”
“Obviously, we can’t leave them here. They might be able to repair their ship and find a way back to join with other Truist forces. Then they will continue waging their jihad upon many more helpless victims. We need to stand back and hit them with long-range weapons until no one is left alive on that ship to set off that suicide charge.
I know that seems cold for me to say that. But there is no way that any of those people will allow themselves to be taken alive. They also know that they have far too much blood on their hands already for any kind of forgiveness that you might be willing to offer. Moreover, they crave to strike one last time at the forces of the non-believers that they see us as being.”
Alec silently contemplated Angela’s words for the longest minute that he could remember. Then he finally spoke with a terrible sense of sadness in his voice.
“Alright. Justin, you need to immediately withdraw from that Tiger. I need for Tess and Colin to begin long-range firing upon the Tiger with missiles, mass drivers and other ranged weapons. You will focus on the bridge and engineering sections first.”
Five minutes later, the image of the helpless Tiger began to show more pieces of hull floating away in clouds of debris as the Truist assault shuttle began to take additional hits. This continued on for another ten minutes until the point where the Tiger was suddenly lit up with a light that rivaled that of a supernova for a few moments. The Truists had blown up their own ship rather than allow it to be captured.
Alec heard someone on the bridge quietly say, “Lord, forgive us.” Another person simply said, “Damned shame.”
“Well, that is the end of that particular group of jihadists. Now, we need to count the cost of this particular victory. We did manage to gain another jump tender with that Tramp along with a pair of Dromedaries and that Lion however. I’m sure that more than a few people will be very happy about our elimination of that threat.”
Angela remained silent as Alec spoke. While it was her advice that prevented the Truists from potentially having the opportunity to ruthlessly kill still more people, Angela still felt ashamed because in some small measure, she helped kill more than a hundred human beings that she personally knew at one point. They may not have been friends, but they had served together at some point. These were not nameless, faceless deaths for her.
Jonathan sensed Angela’s sadness and decided to put his arm around her. He drew her close so that she knew that there were people here who loved her in spite of the role that she played in the deaths of those fanatical jihadists.
Alec too saw that look in Angela’s eyes. He reached out and put his hand on her shoulder. As he did so, Angela looked towards Alec who simply nodded in acknowledgement. He did not have to say a single word.
Chapter Forty:
New Hope Station
YBP 1194 Star System, M 67 Star Cluster, Orion Arm
May 30, 2322
“Your marines left me a hell of a mess inside of this ship with all of these holes and wrecked doors that they left here. But it will still be a whole lot of fun to fix her up and get her ready into combat again. I’ve already started fabricating the new doors and any other replacement components that we do not already have available in our stores.” Colin said with a smile after walking through the captured Lion.
“I know that you are going to hate scrapping your old battler though.” Alec noted as he walked alongside Colin as they looked over the privateers’ latest acquisition.
“Well, it won’t be the first time that boat had been sent to the scrap yards. Only this time, it’s going to be a lot more final. I’m actually going to take the captain’s cabin out of her and plug it into the station habitat ring for me to live in. It will actually be a little larger than the quarters that I already have there.”
“Now, you will just need to find someone to share it with.” Alec laughed.
“Well. I am due a bit of liberty now, don’t you think? Once I am done fixing up everything here, I’m going to take some time away and see if I can find a little love out there. Then I am going to marry her, bring her home and start making babies with her. Besides, I’ve got some good engineers trained up here now, don’t I?”
“Yes, you do. Now, do you think that you will be able to get that Lion fully operational in the near future? We still need a heavy battler available.”
“Sure thing, Boss. Since you did such a good job filling my last wish list, I will be able to make that Lion even better than new. She will be able to handle anything that the Syndicates or the Lu’non throw at her.
Also, any systems that are still useable from my Orca will be used to upgrade the station. I’ve already gotten my people to begin removing her fusion plant to install in a new chamber that we just hollowed out. That will give us a big boost of available power.
I will be able to get some of our old surface weapons stations back online as well with equipment that I salvaged from Orca too. That damned Lu’non trashed all of my starboard weapons when it sideswiped me, but most of my portside systems were still workable. Within about six weeks, we will have a lot of those dead zones covered. My old point-defense autocannons and lasers will be very useful warding off incoming missiles and any intruders that do land on our little moon’s surface. We don’t want anyone trying to sneak in here through the back door, obviously.”
“Obviously.” Alec echoed, causing Colin to laugh out loud and Alec to join him in some well deserved laughter.
“So what are you going to name your ‘new’ command, Colin?” Alec asked once he stopped laughing.
“Instead of using some damned Truist name, I’m going to name her ‘Orca II’. I figured that I should honor my old ship. She served us well.”
“That works for me.”
“So we are go
ing to keep that Tramp and the two cargo shuttles that she came with?” Colin asked.
“Yes, keeping the Tramp will give us three jump-capable vessels. That gives us a lot of flexibility in our operations, especially considering that this particular Tramp is rather well armed for a commercial jump tender. The two Dromedaries will give us some additional lift capability when we decide to carry high-security cargos for a client.
Our credit account is in pretty good shape at the moment. Earth Fleet was very pleased with out elimination of that particular Truist band. Earth Fleet wasn’t quite as happy with us keeping a former Earth Fleet Lion-class heavy battler. But we have a solid claim as legitimate salvage. In any event, there was a little bit of a bounty of those jihadists. We got their demise saved for posterity on our combat recorders as evidence too.”
“I wouldn’t have parted with my new Orca, no matter what Earth Fleet said anyway.” Colin insisted.
“I didn’t think that you would. Besides, your new Orca II is a tremendous addition to our forces here.”
“What are you going to name that jump tender that we just took from the Truists, Boss?” Purity of Flame is just too much of a mouthful to be saying all of the time. Besides, I hate having anything named after some Truist thing.”
“I was thinking of calling her ‘Fireball’. It’s easy to say, yet fairly close to her previous name in case we have any people who are still a little superstitious.”
“That works for me just fine, Boss.” Colin happily replied.
Alec looked through the various projects being worked on inside the main interior chamber and subsidiary areas before going back inside the pressurized area of the station. He then shed his vacuum suit and put on some comfortable, nondescript coveralls before heading out to the station’s shops on the habitat rings.
With the exception of the obvious gentle curvature of the floor, the commercial shops area of the station was little different from the shops on most colonial world settlements. Alec had made arrangements for some of the residents of the station to open up retail shops within this part of the habitat ring to bring a certain sense of normality.
In addition to basic foodstuffs, Alec had contracted with Mister Wisp to have a variety of consumer goods available for purchase at wholesale. As a part of the continuing security measures for the station though, Alec had every single item very carefully scanned for electronic tracking and listening devices. The products were then brought in via one of Alacrity’s big cargo shuttles on the final legs of the journey to the station.
There were shops that sold clothing, personal electronics, the latest entertainment video features, jewelry and even old-fashioned paperbound books. There was also over a dozen restaurants of various types ranging from in cuisine from quickly prepared food for people who needed a fast meal to go all the way up to elaborately cooked luxury meals. Most people did not prepare their own meals in their quarters though, especially since Alec had a central dining facility available for all of the residents of the station at a nominal cost.
Everyone was very friendly to Alec as he walked through the commercial retail area. Crime was very rare within the station, largely due to the constant security surveillance that the station AI maintained throughout. There had been a small amount of discomfort about that surveillance. But Joan, the station’s AI, was so completely unscrupulous about being completely fair to everyone involved that no one could truly complain. Alec had a few personnel that he had drawn from his Marine force that served as a constabulary force. But he remained the ultimate arbitrator in the rare event of a crime. He was also, after all, the man who signed everyone’s paycheck on the station.
As he walked through, a pair of people caught Alec’s attention. He decided to walk over and say hello to them as they stood by one of the station’s tiny jewelry vendors.
“Hello, Jonathan and Angela. How have you two been doing?” He pleasantly asked.
“We are doing very well, thank you, Sir. It has been a very monumental day for both of us.” Jonathan quickly answered.
Alec had known that Jonathan and Angela had been romantically involved ever since shortly after they had asked to join Alec’s privateer group. It was very common to see the couple walking around hand in hand.
“Really? What happened?”
“Jonathan has asked me to marry him.” A beaming Angela answered, lifting up her hand to show Alec a brand new diamond-topped engagement ring.
“Congratulations are then due to both of you. When will the ceremony be?” Alec asked.
“We want to get married as soon as possible. We have to now contact Pastor Beverly to see when she is available to marry us. It is actually very fortunate that we ran into you, Sir. Angela would like it very much if you would walk her down the aisle. Obviously, her parents are not available.” Jonathan explained.
Alec was pleasantly shocked at the request. He had never had the opportunity to do anything like this, even as the captain of a ship.
“I would be very much honored to assist you in this way, Angela. Thank you very much. Just let me know when to show up and what to wear.” Alec replied with a huge smile.
“The attire is obviously not going to be particularly traditional. Wedding dresses are a little hard to come by around here, though we are going to try to do the best that we can. I’m sure that whatever you choose to wear with be just fine with us, Sir.”
“Alright. I look forward to hearing from you soon. I will do my best to clear my schedule.”
Less than three hours later, Alec got a text message on his personal communications link. It was from Jonathan and Angela giving him the time and place of their wedding. It was just over twenty-four hours from now. But Alex knew that he would be ready by then. First, he had to make a quick visit to the station’s chaplain.
Reverend Beverly was originally brought to the station as the spouse of one of the technicians posted aboard the Golden Phoenix. The petite woman with short, prematurely grey hair and a quick smile had quickly become one of the most popular people on the station as she provided ministerial services for the people aboard the station. Even the people who were not Christians often came to her for counseling and a kind shoulder to lean upon.
‘Rev Bev’, as everyone called her, quickly earned Alec’s respect after the first battles in which there were casualties among his people. She seemed to be everywhere, comforting the injured as well as the families of those who had lost loved ones. The morale throughout the station was quickly lifted up by her actions. Even without a formal position, Beverly soon became the station’s de facto chaplain.
“Hello, Rev Bev.”
“Hi, Captain Martinson. I am very pleased to see you today. What can I do for you? She asked.
“I’m here because of something that a couple of my people have asked me to help them with.”
“Ahh, yes. That must be Jonathan and Angela’s wedding. They must think very highly of you. Of course, I have to admit that you do have a reputation of going above and beyond in order to take care of the people here. Many people here certainly respect you for that, including myself. It is unfortunate that you have not been able to attend worship services very often. I’m sure that many of the people here would appreciate it if you did.”
“I’m sorry, Pastor. I just don’t ever seem to have enough time for many of the things that I would like to do. I have certainly seen the impact that faith has made upon both Angela and Jonathan. The strength that both of them have exhibited as a result is very inspirational to everyone around them.”
“I can easily believe that after getting to know Angela and Jonathan during the past few months. I am certainly looking forward to uniting them in holy matrimony tomorrow.”
“I do too, Pastor. Is there anything special that I need to do while I walk down the aisle with the bride? I haven’t had a lot of experience with these sorts of things, I’m afraid.” Alec sheepishly admitted.
“Well, there really isn’t all that much that you have to do,
Captain. Just smile a lot and enjoy the moment. If there is anything that comes up, I will let you know what to do.”
“Thank you, Pastor. I better leave now. I have so many things that I need to do before tomorrow, most of which were supposed to have been done yesterday.”
“I wish you a very blessed day. I look forward to seeing you tomorrow. It will be a very special day for all of the people in attendance, I’m sure.”
One of the currently unused pressurized storage chambers had been converted months earlier to be a public meeting hall as well as the station’s common worship services area. It was the obvious location for Angela and Jonathan’s wedding to be held, of course.
Chairs had been set up for more than two hundred people originally. But as the numbers of people arriving for the wedding ceremony swelled, several people had to quickly search the station for additional chairs to seat everyone. It looked like at least a third of the station’s personnel had decided to attend the wedding.
Alec walked into the back of the chamber wearing the old formal dress uniform that he still had from his days serving with the Gliese Confederation Navy, complete with several rows of awards that he had earned during his service with it. A few minutes after Alec arrived, the bride and several other female residents of the station arrived.
Angela was wearing a simple white dress with few accoutrements. But it certainly highlighted her basic beauty as her long, blonde hair cascaded over her shoulders. Her joyous smile seemed to outshine even the lights that had been illuminating the chamber.
“Hello, Angela. You look absolutely breathtaking in that dress. I want to thank you for inviting me to be a part of your wedding.” Alec humbly said.
“You are very welcome. You opened up your home to us when we first arrived and trusted us in spite of our origins. We cannot thank you enough for all of that and more. We all have become a family thanks to you, Sir. All you have to do is look out at the crowd that has gathered here to see that.”