Tethered Worlds: Blue Star Setting Page 44

  Janus turned on his admiral. "I have half a dozen worthless worlds doing nothing with 'mankind's greatest invention' except burning through our treasury!"

  Buisart shrank back. "Yes, sir."

  "We can still bring in whole reinforcement squadrons from the egress we left while the grimes try to coalesce scraps scattered across the Palisades."

  "We have the exact position of the Polemarkh's command cruiser behind the egress," the android said. "He's stationary."

  "Fool."

  The pain was intense and sudden. Jordahk gripped his head with both hands. He had not felt anything like it since the asteroid belts of Grjot.

  "What is it?" Khai asked.

  "Can't you feel it? Somebody's doing something intense across space... Sojourner intense. My grandfather."

  "A just-reactivated vessel is racing away from the staryard," Aurora said.

  "It's the fireship," Max added.

  The pain began to lessen. Either that or Jordahk was getting used to it. Probably both. Khai reached for his hand. He pulled it away.

  "No, you've done enough. Aurora, show me the course."

  The speeding contact would pass the egress, zip through the Vallum Corps lines, and head for the heart of the invading fleet. But it was still only one little ship.

  A new anger rose within him, briefly eclipsing what he felt for the Perigeum.

  Why am I out here? Me, a kid from Adams Rush! Where's the vaunted Thule-Riss? And if not him, where are all the other Sojourners? Why must my grandfather bear this burden alone?

  "I belong anywhere but here!" Jordahk said in exasperation.

  Khai and even the AIs let him cool for a moment.

  "You do not belong everywhere, you belong somewhere," Khai said.

  "She's right, kid," Max said. "If not you, who?"

  He accepted it temporarily, but resigned himself to get more answers someday. Then the crisis of doubt passed, and his lungs filled afresh.

  "Gasket and I await your commands," Aurora said. The way she said it made him sit taller.

  A comm VAD opened. Aristahl was pale. Though trying to hide it, his expression was skewed with strain. One hand reached out before him.

  "Jordahk." His eye twitched. "Intercept the fireship as quickly as possible. As distance increases, it grows increasingly difficult to hold together."

  He could hear Torious working in the background. "It's feast or famine with this family."

  There was no more time to question, only act. "Aurora, best speed. Forget our frigate! Get us there."

  "No, no. You will need the frigate."

  Jordahk grimaced. "Come on, Pops! Let me help."

  "You will. You are still far ahead and can intercept with your frigate by the time the fireship reaches the Vallum Corps line." He took a deep breath. "That pace will also allow your new friends from Demeter to keep up."

  "They do seem determined to follow us," Khai said.

  "This fireship is broken," Aristahl continued. "A botched mystic to scientum conversion. There are gaps everywhere I am holding together, and the ship was a dangerous design to begin with." He winced with one eye. "Fire tethers, use the landing gear and latch the Aurora to it. You will be able to feel it directly through the stalks."

  "We're going to have to let it go sometime."

  "Hopefully it will stay active long enough to detonate once you are clear. You might take out a few Perigeum ships. If not, at least it will disrupt their lines, giving the Vallum Corps and your father a counterattack opening."

  Aurora crunched the numbers and banked.

  "Intercept plotted," Jordahk said. "Can you make it?"

  "Yes. Heed my advice. Do not reach in too deep. I sense this fireship was touched by one high in our order. That is reason enough to take a chance on its effectiveness, but it also escalates the danger to us."

  As they closed to intercept near the Vallum Corps, energy spiked on the First Cruiser. Alarms sounded on the Aurora and likely every ship in the star system.

  "It's firing," Max said.

  "Not again." Jordahk was incredulous. "At what?" As the Perigeum ships made way, Aurora painted her estimation. "No."

  The light of accumulating energy radiated from within the Perigeum lines, silhouetting ships before it. The front of the First Cruiser blazed like a sun before releasing its bar of destruction. It left the Perigeum fleet, crossed in front of Windermere, passed by the juking Vallum Corps, and slammed into the egress.

  "Tesla's rays!"

  "Apt," Max said.

  Even the beam of an Artemis paused, for about a second, before burning through the bulk of an egress. It blasted out the back, making a second hole in "mankind's greatest invention." Ship-sized slabs of granix tumbled away from the impact. The Polemarkh's stationary command cruiser and destroyer escort were caught flatfooted. One escort was flattened by a destroyer-sized slab of egress. It went dead, pitching down toward Windermere, launching boats.

  The remaining escort destroyer and command cruiser were engulfed in energy. The destroyer broke apart immediately. The command cruiser lasted for an additional second as it peeled away from the bow in sections before disintegrating. The beam's energy finally consumed, the last trickles disappeared into space.

  Pushed backwards, the egress rotated like a slowly spinning, moon-sized coin on edge.

  Khai broke the shocked silence. "That was... unexpected."

  Quite the understatement.

  Communication spiked across the battle, and only discipline kept chaos from ruling in the Vallum Corps. The P-Stars continued their approach, slowing slightly as they entered engagement range with the reforming defenders. Beyond the majestically rotating egress was the mystic staryard segment. It would be in range of the Artemis soon.

  "The Vallum Corps is querying us," Aurora said.

  The face of Capt. Mason Steede appeared. His eyes darted across displays, more amazed than shocked. "What are you doing?"

  "I, uh, take it you're in charge now?" Jordahk asked.

  Mason's eyes stopped darting. "In the end, the Polemarkh lost his way."

  Jordahk nodded. "I'm rendezvousing with that fireship. Can you give us some cover to the Perigeum lines?"

  "That's crazy. You'll never make it."

  Jordahk was also starting to dislike that word. "Will you do it?"

  "We don't use fireships anymore. Shipboard weapon ranges have increased. Space is too big to catch anybody within the blast radius."

  "We'll get it close enough."

  Whether it blows up or not is another story.

  "At least ready a counterattack as they move out of the way," Jordahk continued. "They can't dodge too far space side, not with my father coming in with those heavies."

  "He's your father?" Mason allowed himself a small head shake. "I don't know what's going on here, but I don't have a better plan." He looked to the side. "Savalis, the Demeter senior commander, is going to stay with you as long as he can."

  "Be ready, we're not slowing down."

  Something crossed Mason's expression. A wordless exchange between warriors who may be about to die. "Godspeed." His image faded out.

  The Aurora swooped in fast, angling toward the Perigeum line to match the course of the recklessly thrusting fireship. The two drones stayed close, but the automated mystic frigate barely kept up. Jordahk closed his eyes and reached out, trying to take the burden from his grandfather.

  "I'm close, Pops. Let me have it."

  Aristahl's face appeared, looking even more drawn. He released the fireship without argument, which only gave Jordahk more concern for his health.

  The burden was immediate, nearly ripping Jordahk off the command couch. It was no use trying the control stalks. As of yet, nothing could be felt through them beyond the ship. He could sense the fireship's systems winking out. He wasn't ready to hold it without resonance contact.

  "Fire the tethers! Get us against it fast."

  With one hand, he held his head. With the other, he reache
d out to where he thought the fireship was. It helped a little to focus his thoughts, but this job required a physical connection, not an ethereal thread. He squinted in pain. Doing it like this was too hard.

  "Tethers launched," Khai said. "We have contact. Jorh-Dahk, the stalks!"

  He palmed them, and was plunged immediately into a different world of bright lights, conduits, and gaps. Foundation space. He wasn't sure if his physical eyes were open or closed, and he couldn't concentrate away from what he was seeing to find out.

  "Moving the drones," Aurora said.

  The fire coming in was still at long range, still easy to dodge or break apart with defense guns. That wouldn't last.

  "We need the frigate in front," Khai said.

  "It'll catch up now as we latch," Max said.

  Through the stalks Jordahk had an awareness of Aurora's systems and the positions of the ships around them. He sensed the powerful mystic technology of the two Demeter trebuchets and their ward drone escorts. They pulled up close, deploying their remaining drones as an umbrella in front of the whole flotilla.

  Aurora's landing gear pressed against the smaller fireship. But latched together, their combined mass impeded maneuverability. "We don't want to outmaneuver the trebs anyway," Jordahk said. They needed the protection umbrella as long as possible.

  Too much speed wouldn't help anyway. The faster they went, the more predictable their vector. Such predictability would get them shot. The trick was finding the fastest speed at which a given vessel's thrust could still initiate effective dodges. The physics of inertia, at least as far as whole ships were concerned, had not changed.

  "Listen to this," Max said.

  "This is Captain Mason Steede. Tighten up your fire gruppes and join the cascading box formation as ordered. We're advancing. Green Gruppe, hold here and protect the staryard from incidental fire."

  "We have successfully slowed the Perigeum advance," Khai said.

  "They didn't expect us to leap out at them," Max said. "But they can't slow down too much with Kord breathing down their backs. Their path to victory is forward."

  Jordahk heard it all as background, understanding it in 3D from his connection with Aurora. The vision of foundation space before him was reminiscent of the mystic switch his father had added to their last training run.

  How long ago was that?

  The large, canal-like paths were not as twisting. Segments were missing, and entire intersections were gone. Yet energy was still flowing across them through crystal conduits. He realized they were what he was holding together, at least on the surface, to keep systems energized. Fashioned by his grandfather, whether they were physical or just manifestations he didn't know, nor did it matter.

  He raced through the canals, shoring up failing conduits. Just that one lap caused him to overheat. He looked toward the center of the fireship and wasn't surprised to find a careful arrangement of thermo-magnetic bombs. Seeded throughout them were mystic creations of a sort he had never seen. They reminded him a little of the Aurora's grav impellers. If that was the case, he was afraid to activate even one, and there were many.

  At the center of the charges was a furious sun. It was some sort of fusion reactor. But even hardened for shipboard roughhousing, like a galleon's, what was it doing there? It wasn't needed to detonate charges, and it seemed more than a little dangerous among enough firepower to level a moon.

  He was too hot and it was too fatiguing to think. He closed his eyes, at least mentally, to rest for just a moment...

  Alarms blared in the distance, and he sensed commotion all around. Aurora was trying to reach him, and so was the familiar presence of Max, even Khai. He focused with a start.

  How long was I out?

  The crystal conduits were disintegrating. Plasma was filling the ship in all the wrong ways, encroaching on the bomb bays, scorching the grav impeller devices. The fireship was about to tear itself apart. He reached out with both hands, strengthening as many crystal conduits as possible. He couldn't rest for a second!

  He got the impression Khai wanted to touch him, desperate to help. She could communicate with the fireship, but to affect change she needed to go through him. It was all he could do just to hang on, but he wouldn't let her burn her unique brain on this.

  He felt for Aurora, again reaching out through her systems and seeing the larger battle. It was like playing the pianochord with two hands doing two different things. Though his mother was quite good at it, he could never get the hang of the instrument. His mind kept trying to focus on one or the other. It was maddening.

  They were already halfway to the detonation point. The Demeter trebuchets were emptying their magazines, firing every rock as fast as their accelerators would overcharge. He sensed their technology. It was reminiscent of Alb-Sone's scout. But he had no time to dwell on it. The umbrella of drones was thinning, and their flotilla was taking hits.

  Every P-Star gruppe that closed the range felt the wrath of those new scattershot trebuchets. And their wrath was considerable. A broken squadron of wounded frigates had just withstood a hellacious salvo. What were they doing so far up by themselves? The tactician in him wanted to know.

  The Demeter ships were not maneuverable enough for this tip-of-the-spear attack. They were artillery support ships, delivering carpet fire from the main line. Hits accumulated quickly upon them as ward drones were destroyed one by one. But Savalis knew this, which was why he emptied their magazines furiously.

  One of the trebuchets charged to fire again, but its bow was damaged and the front sections exploded. The ship pitched upward, momentarily out of control before getting its helm back. It twisted back toward the Vallum Corps lines. The Perigeum Starmada wasn't interested in finishing it, apparently. Their greater concern was the fireship.

  The other trebuchet fired its last salvos and twisted away similarly, leaving its few remaining ward drones behind to protect the flotilla. Jordahk thought he heard someone from that ship say something, but it was too far to hear clearly.

  With the trebuchets out, maneuvers became more dramatic, as much as their damaged mystic frigate could handle. They had gotten their coin's worth out of the old hulk. He was amazed that it and the two cloud cruiser drones remained. Probably because the ward drones had taken all the fire they could. The last of them burned away.

  Immediately, they received more hits. There was no way to hide completely behind the frigate, not when the Perigeum had so many angles. A crossfire of pink beams lanced through the flotilla, hitting them all. Alarms sounded. He had to let go of Aurora's systems and plunge fully into the fireship.

  It was damaged. Ruptured lines were bringing it to the brink of premature detonation. Jordahk gripped with both hands and willed himself to form new crystal enclosures to contain the flow. Pain seared across his scalp. His vision blurred, but he couldn't let up, because if he did...

  Pheron didn't want to die, but he couldn't exactly think of a realistic reason to live. Except maybe to ram his former command cruiser, now half-wrecked by Commander Moron. That would be a better way to go than forced into enemy fire like so much fodder. But of course, there was his men to think of.

  Those strange trebuchets were beasts. He could have used their firepower at Adams Rush. Hell, even regular trebuchets. But artillery ships were too intimidating for subtlety, although they were a right fit for this battle.

  Holding their advancing section of the line with broken frigates and without support from the command cruiser and destroyers was brutal. Six of the dozen frigates he nominally commanded at the start of this deployment were destroyed, adrift, or limping back toward hilltop. Colliers were picking up boats, so his surviving men from the Egress Incident could be placed again on overly dangerous assignments until, one day, they did not survive. The trail of debris stretching back from his part of the line was sad testimony.

  "Forward, gruppe lieutenant," Decard said. "I want that fireship intercepted by our wing."

  By "our wing," Commander Mor
on certainly meant just the frigates. His hurting command cruiser was hiding behind its escort destroyer.

  "But commander, we've got two colliers coming up for battlefield reload and medical evac."

  Apparently, fleet command wanted them to die with full bunkers. They were already dropping back for their turn in the collier's rotation. Automated reloading was quick through multiple ports designed for that purpose, and maneuvering systems linked so that both ships acted as one performing low-intensity dodges as necessary. They could be back on the wing commander's suicide run in 10 minutes.

  "That won't be needed for you to complete your mission," Decard said.

  Yes, why waste resources on a ship about to die.

  "The orders come from the flagship, wing commander."

  Decard looked uncertain, then acquiesced. "If you're not streaking in front of me in eight minutes, I'll shoot you myself."

  Pheron couldn't ignore the irony of those words, very similar to ones he had used on another Perigeum ship the year before. Long ago, his mother had said something. "You reap what you sow." As an adult, he filed that away as ancient folklore. Now it had new poignancy.

  The automated docking sequence started. He modified the reload, shortening it so they could make their appointment with death. He toyed with the idea of telling all hands to board the collier. It might not go well for them if it was revealed they abandoned ship prematurely, but at least they would be alive.

  At least the number of crew was relatively small, especially in historical comparison. Modern warships were highly automated, even this worn-out hulk. He knew every man by name and surmised his vets would want to see it through. He certainly didn't deserve such loyalty. The Adams Rush Egress Incident built stronger bonds than he realized. And many were from lesser-known Perigeum planets in various states of failure. Their life was here, for better or worse.

  "All hands are free to board the collier."

  His sub-ensign looked back and simply shook his head, then went back to work.

  The Perigeum didn't deserve people like his sub-ensign.

  He checked the trimensional display. The command cruiser was also being serviced by a collier. It would have full bunkers from which to shoot Pheron's gruppe in the back. The fireship was streaking closer, the last of the strange ward drones burned away. A frigate, which looked little better than his, two leftover drones from a cloud cruiser, and a legend from out of the past were doing their best to get the obsolete ship within range.