Chapter 11
Translight!
Booted feet struck the deck nearby, and Keelic and Thotti ran lightly around the nearest bend. Crouching next to the wall, they watched three rows of men march past, their light-grav strides all in unison. Keelic had not expected pirates to be so disciplined.
He checked the scanner but couldn’t quite figure out where they were. The screen showed only a small section nearby and couldn’t penetrate any of the walls. Trying to figure out the deck plan, he saw that unlike the flat decks of the simulator, he was now on a circular vessel with concentric decks. The layout fell into place in his mind, and they set out for the bridge.
As they penetrated deeper, the pull against the deck plates increased. All the while, faint shouts rang out above and behind them.
Keelic found himself sprawling on the deck at his friend’s crimson urging, as crackling energy shredded the air above them. The instant it stopped, they ran and jumped down a ladder-well. A wash of heat and smoke blew down on them as they fell in light gravity for three decks. Landing hard, Keelic rolled away from the ladder, moaning in pain.
They were in a chamber with five gigantic doors, each one taking up a wall. Thotti was at a panel. Keelic recognized the area as part of the cargo passage system used for moving equipment and goods throughout the ship.
Hot violence exploded from the ladder-well. Keelic covered his head with his arms, then the floor grated and hissed open. He rolled into the crack, fell ten feet, getting some of the air knocked out of him as he landed. Thotti hopped down after, then leapt straight back up to the door panel on the ceiling. The door slammed shut and Thotti let go, landing lightly.
Blood dripped from a gash in Keelic’s left cheek. He looked around as his friend snuggled up to him. They were lying on a curved surface that disappeared into the distance in both directions. Conduits and support arches filled the space between the gleaming surface and the ceiling.
Keelic said, "It’s a torpedo tube."
With effort, he stood and looked up at the door panel. Its reading showed that someone was trying to open it.
"Did you use a Security Breach Code?"
Orange mauve pleased blue affirmative.
Keelic wiped his eyes, careful of his cheek, and thought.
"I’ll bet this is forward tube one," he said, looking at the model of the ship his friend provided, and comparing that to what his scanner showed. It told him little. The walls and floor were all impenetrable.
Distant shouts echoed.
"We have to get to the bridge," Keelic said. "There are other doors like this all around the tube. They’ll be opening those soon. We have to find one first."
They ran toward the aft of the ship along the top of the tube, stopping when they heard shouts in front of them. Men were running up the tube.
Keelic whirled around, but pursuit was everywhere.
The alien leapt to the ceiling beside a door. Keelic started climbing the ladder to it as Thotti opened the door. An explosion blew Keelic off.
Stunned and aching, his hair smoking and face burned, he looked up from where he lay and saw six men aiming weapons at him from above.
"Got it!" yelled one with a scanner and headset.
"If it flinches, burn it," said a badly scarred man missing half the fingers of each hand, his weapon steady on Keelic’s forehead.
"Bet it’s a morpher," said one of the younger ones. Others nodded.
"Can’t we burn it?" asked another.
The man with the scanner glanced up from the screen and said, "Lord Kua wants to see it before it dies."
Keelic feared to move and told his friend not to try anything. Thotti clung to the ceiling out of sight and radiated white-red fear streaked with purple-red flashing anger.
More men came running, some with scanners, all armed. The man with the scanner above Keelic studied his machine, blinked, studied it again.
"What?" snarled Fewfingers.
"There were two, but now there’s just one," he said.
"What is it?"
"Scans as a human boy."
"Morphers can’t do that," said Fewfingers.
The crowd of men in the hall above parted as though by force beam. A man Keelic recognized strode up to the edge of the doorway, followed by a heavily armed escort and a man with a modern military scanner hovering before him.
Cold yellow eyes scrutinized Keelic, and he smiled the same savage smile Keelic remembered from the hover shuttle when his family first arrived on Ermol. He was dressed in another set of skins, darker.
"Where is the other?" he asked.
Keelic thought the man might be asking him, but kept his mouth shut.
The first man with a scanner answered, "Lord, it was here, but it’s disappeared, Lord."
Hard yellow eyes turned on the speaker, who blanched. The eyes slipped over the assembled crowd and they dispersed, beginning search operations once more.
The man in skins sprang, landing lightly beside Keelic. Heart racing, Keelic held perfectly still as the man knelt, removed Keelic’s belt, and handed it to a man standing near.
"Stand, boy."
It was an order Keelic feared to disobey more than he feared the guns still pointing at him. He struggled up, aware of the bruises just received and the burns on the left side of his face. Tears of pain streaked his cheeks. He avoided looking the man in the eyes, feeling that Thotti was concentrating on all the men around, but mainly on those with scanners, keeping himself hidden. The one with the big, hovering military scanner touched and worked it constantly.
"Do ya still wonder who I is, boy?"
Keelic knew who the man was, and it left him mute, but something in the unblinking gaze demanded obedience. Keelic shook his head.
The man in skins seemed to be waiting. Keelic did not want to make this man wait, so he opened his mouth, but nothing came out. The man leaned forward, a braid of black hair sliding off his shoulder to swing by his face.
Keelic stammered, "Ja—Jaw Taka-ta-Kua."
Then in a gush, "CaptainoftheDeathClouldmostfearedpirateinthegalaxy."
Jaw stood with a small smile and said, "Even the children."
Keelic nodded, and Jaw looked down at him, seemed about to leave when Keelic said, "I—I read all about you," and added quickly, "Lord."
Something changed on Jaw’s face, and, encouraged, Keelic said, "I read that you have the most powerful fleet, and that you have the only surviving Lasiter Attack Frigate, and you’ve killed more people than most wars have, and—"
Jaw started to chuckle, and Keelic flushed, thinking it was aimed at him, but realized that he had pleased the captain. His mind raced.
Jaw caught Keelic’s gaze and asked, "How is it you know so much layout of my ship?"
Pinned, Keelic squirmed inside his suit but could not turn from that gaze.
"I studied. Lord."
"And what you think?"
Keelic felt that he was being asked about more than just the ship, but had no trouble with an answer. "Awesome, Lord."
Jaw motioned for Keelic to ascend the ladder. Adrenaline and orange warmth from his friend gave him the strength to ignore the pain that every movement brought.
He reached the top and was grabbed, his arms wrenched behind him and locked together.
Thotti came up as well and crawled onto the ceiling above Keelic. It took a lot of effort not to look up to reassure himself of his friend’s presence.
A man of the bodyguard knelt and said, "Lord."
Jaw turned, and the man stood. Keelic saw that the man was augmented, and had the look of someone in deep concentration.
He spoke like a translator. "All material has transited to the Nova-Lance. Intruder search negative on decks one, two, and three. Escape of one Mercury courier. Commander Brubatta on the bridge. Pathfinder not located. Planet quiet. System quiet."
Keelic summoned all his courage and said, "Lord?"
A soldier raised a weapon, and the man holding Keelic stepped aw
ay.
"Could I see the bridge, Lord?"
Jaw blinked. The man holding the weapon hesitated, looking at his captain for guidance.
A slow smile crinkled the skin of Jaw’s face, and the man lowered his weapon hastily. Jaw strode away, and someone pushed Keelic to follow, but not harshly, and unlocked the shackles on his arms.
Limping along, Keelic allowed himself one glance at the ceiling where Thotti crawled, and tried not to show the triumph he felt. They followed a familiar route to the bridge, Keelic noting differences in corridor and hall layout.
He forgot all but the worst of his pains, and felt his heart pounding harder than the day he had first stepped onto the bridge of the simulator.
The massive gleaming door was guarded by two men standing behind force-shielded, tripod-mounted guns. In the back of his mind, Keelic wondered why they weren’t using the Internal Defense System, and glanced surreptitiously at the ionizer mountings along the walls. Most of the armored men in the bodyguard took up positions behind the shielded guns.
The Gleaming Door split and slid away in layers, and they walked onto a bridge very different from the simulator. Panel position and seating were similar, but there were men, women, and Paboosht everywhere. Much of the darklight cloth was gone or hanging in shreds, and the room was filled with the soft hum of voices mingled with console beeps, sirens, and chimes. There was no voice of a Ship-Ann, however. Many of the panels were open with interior components hanging out, grafted to strange devices.
All of the people turned toward Jaw with lowered eyes and said in unison, "Lord," then turned back to their stations.
The holo display in the center showed thousands of ships orbiting the planet. Ermol Station wasn’t visible. At least half of the console panels at every station were dark, as were six entire stations. A proximity chime from a general-purpose station caught Keelic’s attention. He could see that it was being dedicated to the tracking of debris, and that a large chunk of something was on a collision course with the ship.
The woman at the station spoke coordinates into the comlink she wore. The man at the backup weapons con went into action and fired on the debris. Keelic realized they didn’t have the BridgeNet working, which meant that they didn’t have the IntegralNets, either. How could they even fly the ship?
The door closed behind Keelic. Jaw was down in the central well, listening to the dark-skinned commander of the shuttle that had captured Keelic. He must be the commander 'on the bridge' from the status update given to Jaw, Commander Brubatta. The man glanced venomously at Keelic and said something that made Jaw laugh. The commander’s lips tightened. Keelic caught from Jaw, "Just a boy..."
Keelic swelled his chest with defiance, and the man holding him increased his grip. Commander Brubatta snarled and held up Keelic’s pistol. Jaw dismissed whatever it was he said.
Make me disappear, thought Keelic, and do something to distract them.
Thotti pushed off the ceiling onto the Resource Allocation station, tapped a quick pattern, then hopped to the Command console while the man at Resource Allocation frowned at his console.
Thotti took a firm hold, and touched a Command panel with one tentacle. Everyone standing found that the floor had slipped out, and anything aft had decided to attack them—except Keelic, who had ducked out of grasp and braced himself as the engines engaged.
Lances of invisible energy punched gaping holes in succession across the wall where Keelic had been seconds before, liquefying bodies and destroying consoles.
The navigator shut down the engines, and Jaw stood from where he had fired with Keelic’s pistol. Commander Brubatta, holding his side, struggled to stand, vindication in his every move.
Keelic crawled down into the Command well, then behind the Dense-Matter Control chair.
"Lord," said the woman at the Scanners console, "the fleet is following."
Keelic waved his hand in front of the engineer, who blinked and squinted at the display. Keelic tapped an Emergency Engineering Deactivation Command Sequence on a bright pad, shutting down the entire display.
The engineer’s eyes widened, and he called out, "Lord, something is operating my panel!"
Blinding crimson!
Keelic ducked as the top half of the engineer was sheared off, splattering the backs of chairs above the Command well with the man and pieces of his chair.
Thotti crawled around the wall of the holo display and met Keelic. They cowered as Jaw said, "Something is here. Weapons ready." People shifted positions around the bridge, weapons out.
They don’t know the Command Sequences, thought Keelic, not looking at what was left of the engineer.
Light-blue crimson affirmative. Yellow crimson activate Intruder Defense System.
Yes, but first we have to get control of the bridge some other way. The IDS won’t know to ignore us unless we program it, and I don’t want to try that.
White-orange affirmative.
A pressure thrust against Keelic’s skull, trying to crush his mind, and he gasped. He gripped Thotti tightly until he realized that it was coming from the alien.
Keelic asked, Yellow wrong?
Stretched crimson pain of fifty eyes.
Keelic thought about what that meant, then yellow-asked, It’s hurting you to make them not see us?
Blue lanced with crimson affirmative.
We’ll make them all leave, thought Keelic forcefully. I’ll do it. You just make what I do invisible to them. They won’t hurt you anymore.
Keelic crawled on hands and knees around to the Command console, where Jaw was now leading the fleet back to the planet. Gingerly, Keelic tapped on a minor side panel. It accepted his Security Breach Code. Jaw’s head snapped around along with the pistol to look at the now dark panel.
Ducking below the pistol, Keelic typed the Emergency Shutdown Command into the primary panel, feeling his friend’s pain stronger now. Every console on the bridge went dark.
Jaw Taka-ta-Kua roared, and Keelic stumbled back in fear. Jaw leapt out of the Command seat, aiming at the console, but Commander Brubatta gripped his wrist, and the blast struck down a scaly Paboosht who had been standing at the engineering console across the holo-pit display.
Jaw struck Brubatta in the throat, sending him reeling. He fell and writhed on the floor, gagging, clutching his throat. Face purple, Brubatta gripped his larynx with both hands and squeezed, tendons standing out. There was a soft crunch; he gasped, gagged again, and coughed blood. Rolling over, Brubatta hacked and gasped. Jaw watched with a savage smile.
Using the stair rail, Brubatta pulled himself up and croaked something unintelligible, waving a hand weakly around the bridge.
Jaw looked at the man with the scanner, who shook his head.
Scanning the quiet bridge, Jaw bared his teeth, ran up to the door, and keyed it open. Once through, he knocked aside one of the men at the mounted cannon, and turned it around to aim at the bridge. People scrambled to get out of the line of fire.
Keelic sprinted and leapt under the railing of the well, sliding to the wall on his belly. A whine came from the gun. Keelic jumped up and pounded the emergency close panel.
The twelve layers of the meter-thick door slammed shut with an ear-splitting crack. Simultaneously, what was left of the people who had been in the doorway squirted out and splashed over the bridge. Keelic’s body swirled with nausea, and he vomited on the floor. Worried that Thotti might not be able to hide that, Keelic stepped back from the spot.
Commander Brubatta stood painfully from where he had ducked for cover. He walked slowly, breath harsh, up the stair out of the Command well and to the door panel. Keelic stepped back secured it with a Breach Code. Brubatta's jaw clenched.
Someone said, "If we open it, won’t Lord Kua fire?"
Brubatta ignored the question and touched the door panel. It didn’t even beep in response. A distant explosion, then another, and another.
Keelic went back down to the Command station and took out the emergency shu
tdown, but only on that console. More blasts beyond the door.
Brubatta came down to the Command station, scanned its active panels and screens, and croaked almost in Keelic’s ear, "What do you want?"
Keelic typed on the screen, "MY PARENTS BACK."
Brubatta’s face didn’t change. The blasts against the door escalated. Brubatta tried to access an activation menu, but Keelic shut down the console. Brubatta coughed, spat blood to one side, and stood back.
Thotti's pain was growing, making it hard for Keelic to think. He turned on the main console, and activated the Ship-Ann’s voice. Its last activation date had been over one hundred and eighty years ago. Keelic typed in what he wanted.
It said in ordered, velvet tones, "Put all weapons by the door."
Brubatta ordered it done.
Keelic had seen enough vids to know that even after the pile grew high, these people were far from disarmed.
"Everyone out of the well," ordered the Ship-Ann. "Stand facing away from the center of the bridge."
Brubatta nodded and the crew all turned away. Keelic climbed into the Command console seat, manually raised the shield, instituted Vessel Reclamation Protocols, and watched with satisfaction as the beam weapons powered up and the IDS activated. All doors in the ship closed and locked, and force grids snapped on around all critical systems, including the bridge. The room became quiet as the weapon fire beyond the doors was silenced. Internal scanners located and displayed all activity within the vessel.
A visual of the smoke-filled hall showed that the mounted guns had been moved to the far end, and thirty men stood there firing at the bridge doors, which were now behind a shimmer of shielding. Keelic felt a warning through his friend’s pain, and looked up to see Brubatta looking over at the Command console, studying the screens.
Keelic picked a flushing pattern for the IDS’s ionizers, and keyed a pattern that would force the men away from the bridge. Then he looked up at the commander.
Brubatta’s nose flared, but his face remained hard and calculating. His eyes flickered around the room.
Keelic typed an emergency shutdown sequence on a secondary panel, leaving it ready to activate with only a touch. The commander’s eyes flitted to it, then back to the IDS screen.
The ionizers in the halls glowed and discharged brilliantly, creating a tiny thunder-crack. The discharge moved quickly down the hall as men fired blindly. They held their ground until one got caught by the discharge and was cut into neat pieces.
Keelic’s gut flip-flopped as he watched what once had been a person fall into a smoking pile.
Keelic had the Ann say, "Commander, move back and stand against the wall."
Brubatta didn’t move.
"Everyone move to the door and face it. Or we will kill you all."
Brubatta moved back and ordered the people to stand against the door. He walked to the door himself, and faced out. Bending down, he picked up a stunner and fired under his arm at the console.
Keelic twitched and went limp, sliding out of the Command seat and onto the floor. Brubatta turned, crouching, waiting, then ran to the console, hoarsely ordering people to return to their stations. He raised a hand and felt through the air in the Command seat, finding nothing.
Thotti crawled up and along rim of the holo display and activated the shutdown sequence. Once again, the bridge quieted, and the muted explosions began outside.
We’ll teach him, thought Keelic from his crumpled position at the foot of the chair. Get another stunner and shoot them all!
Thotti no longer had the strength to link consciously with Keelic, but he felt the alien’s agreement. Thotti crawled slowly to the pile of weapons by the door, and a few seconds later bodies were striking the floor, Brubatta’s among the first. The guards were protected against a general stun, so Thotti shot them point-blank in the head, which dropped them.
Thotti moved beside Keelic and flopped down next to him on the floor.
Warm happy orange release, deep blue-green relief, pain fading.
Wow, thought Keelic. Why didn’t we do that sooner?
Amused mauve chagrin.
I wish I could move.
Yellow action?
Bring everything back up and flush those guys shooting at us. You gotta do Vessel Reclamation and Re—
Thotti interrupted with agreement colors and pulled Keelic up into the chair. The alien brought the console to life, working two pads simultaneously. Consoles came up blaring alarms and failures all over the bridge. The BridgeNet came up, then collapsed. Every screen showed failures and alarms.
With effort Keelic managed to move a little, but was unable to do anything more, and swore mentally in frustration.
With a jolt he realized that if he could move, so might the crew draped all about. He suggested that Thotti shoot every person with the stunner. Then shoot them all again for good measure.
The alien returned to the console, eyestalks swaying with uncertainty, watching the endless failures and warnings; regarded Keelic for a moment, then returned to the console screens.
Pulling with weak arms, Keelic rose up in the chair. His friend scooted aside to share the seat with him. One eye turned from the display to gaze at Keelic expectantly. Flying the ship was Keelic’s job.
"Reclamation isn’t working. Let’s try the All Systems Purge. We need to keep priority stuff."
Weakly, stepping over bodies, Keelic went to the Defense Systems console, and isolated it, leaving the shield up. The alien did the same with Environmental Systems, and then purged the Command console. They tapped in codes that Thotti pulled from memory.
With the last entry touched, the ship shut down, leaving Keelic and his friend in darkness dimly lit by console light, and totally weightless.
"Space!" said Keelic, searching for the control pad for the seat. He activated its tensile-web, and he and Thotti settled down firmly. Bodies, weapons, and debris began to drift.
A transparent image of the ship appeared in the holo display, showing systems in different colors coming online, and establishing preliminary links with the primary data paths. There was an awful lot of red and pink damage, with yellow reroutes. One by one, the consoles that remained began snapping on, beeping readiness for BridgeNet reestablishment.
Keelic typed in the complete Command Initialization Control Codes, and the image in the display glowed as all systems in the IntegralNet linked every micromillimeter of the ship.
The voice of the Ship-Ann said, "System purge complete. IntegralNets established. Beam weapons charged. Forty-five seconds to aft torpedo battery firing readiness. Four point eight minutes to Main readiness."
Gravity gradually returned, and the bodies settled to the floor.
Keelic cleared his throat and said, "Ship-Announcer, this is Admiral Keelic Travers, serial number 34321-KT-14133. I take complete control of this vessel. Scan me."
"You are scanned and logged, Admiral."
Keelic grinned at Thotti and said, "Keep active functions, and purge and recalibrate Defense Console and Environmental Systems."
"Purging. Recalibration complete. All systems available on your command, Admiral. Damage report compiling. Sir, we are being hailed."
The holo display shifted and resolved into the fleet following the frigate again as they moved slowly away from the planet.
A chill rippled over Keelic. Was all this really happening? He didn't know what to do about the hail. He wasn't ready.
He asked, "Announcer, what’s your name?"
"I am called Lasiter-Announcer 431, of the Sir Richard Grenville. In verbal command parlance I am usually called Las."
"I’ll call you Las, too."
"Yes, Admiral."
Fresh air circulated the scent of atomized intestines, shattered bone, burned electronics, and blood. Nausea bubbled up in Keelic’s aching middle, and he touched on his suit hood so he could breathe clean air.
Yellow, bodies flung down the hall.
"Open the door. Wait!" Keelic
checked the hall scanners. "’Kay, shut off the torpedo tubes."
They went weightless, and Thotti floated to unlock the bridge door, but the outer layer failed to open. Thotti tried again. It groaned, and with a rending screech slid away. The exterior surface was melted and blasted. The walls around the entrance were blackened and chewed-looking, smoking with an acrid odor.
Keelic and Thotti each took a stunner and shot all the floating crew members again, noting that a few had recovered enough to twitch satisfyingly. Near the door, Keelic braced himself by wrapping his legs around the railing above the central Command well. His friend, with incredible agility, caught the bodies and sent them to Keelic, who pushed them down the hall, caroming off the walls in graceful, limp motion. Keelic avoided even looking at the body parts that the alien threw past. Droplets of blood and other fluids swirled gently with the ventilation currents.
Back at the Command console, Keelic began recharging the torpedo tubes. Everything still flying about settled to the floor.
Keelic touched on the shipwide address. After taking a deep breath, he said, "This is Admiral Keelic Travers of the...Ermolian Resistance Force. We have taken control of this vessel in the name of freedom. You’re going to evacuate. Or we will make the Internal Defense System cut you up." He touched off the shipwide.
"Las, when those people in the corridor start moving again, flush them with the ionizers to..." Turning to Thotti, Keelic asked, "How do we get them out?"
Shuttle.
"Las, make all of them go to the shuttle bays. Do you have shuttles?"
"There are currently no Terra Corps dropships on board. There are eight atmospheric gunships of unknown origin in fighter bays three and two. I do not recommend moving the intruders into these bays. The captain’s gig is missing from its bay, as well."
Keelic thought about that for a moment then said, "Okay. Move the intruders to empty bays and give me a visual of the gunships."
A screen on the console lit up showing eight proto-fighters. Memory flashed of a proto-fighter strafing the ground near his house. Worry and fear gripped him as he thought about his parents, and Mr. Hallod, and Leesol. How was he going to find them?
A voice in pale blue: All material has transited to the Nova-Lance.
"Material is people?"
Purple-black-edged affirmation.
Keelic sat back as a sense of terrible awe swept over him. Thotti’s eyes turned to meet his. They looked at one another. People were material. Loot. Another thing to take or destroy. Jaw had done this to dozens of worlds and thousands of ships. The vids were all wrong about pirates. Keelic sat up and laid his hands on the Command console. A plan began to map out in his mind. The ship-to-ship hail panel blinked urgently.
"Las," Keelic asked, "which ship of the fleet following us is the Nova-Lance?"
"Unknown, sir. The Systems Purge removes all transient data from memory."
"Okay. Monitor their communications. Don’t answer that hail."
"Aye, sir. Admiral, they are using encrypted communications. However, I can crack their keys. Ten minutes."
Trying to be patient proved impossible, so Keelic asked, "Is the Cranial Interface working?"
"Yes, sir. It requires training, sir."
"I’ve got it."
He felt the familiar pressure clamp around his head, and closed his eyes. Thotti stabilized the image.
"Damage report complete, Admiral," said Las.
"Tactical," growled Keelic.
The display zoomed out to include the planet. Each vessel was rated according to power envelope and weapons class. There were a lot of battleship-, Wreaker-, and dreadnought-class ships. Thousands upon thousands of them. Keelic swallowed. In the simulator they had never faced so many.
A weapons con panel winked, and Las said, "All tubes at firing readiness."
A siren wailed, and one vessel in orbit around the planet began flashing with symbols and colors that made Keelic’s heart leap into his throat. Was it real?
"Las, what’s that ship?"
"Unrecorded configuration, sir, but its power signature most closely matches Quat-lat Kay-ku patterns," said Las. "They are scanning us."
Keelic didn’t know what to do.
"They are hailing."
Thotti gave Keelic a nudge of umber urgency that made him jerk, and he asked, "Uh, their shields aren’t raised, right?"
"Affirmative, Admiral."
"Um. Have you scanned them?"
"Negative."
"Do it."
"Aye. Their shields have been activated. Preliminary scan shows unknown weaponry, a crew complement of two thousand six hundred eighty-seven Quat-lat Kay-ku, and a power signature Grade Seven."
"What does that mean? What’s our Grade?"
"Grade Ten. We define the scale, Admiral. Their power grade is an estimation of their maximum power output calculated as a percentage of our maximum output. I have broken the enemy fleet codes. The Nova-Lance is in orbit around the planet."
A fat transport ship blinked in the display.
Pride in this ship, and dark anger, displaced Keelic’s fear as he gazed at all manner of ships, human and alien, ancient and modern, that composed the massed power of Jaw Taka-ta-Kua, most feared individual in the galaxy—whose flagship Keelic now owned.
"Battle Protocol."
"Battle Protocol, aye."
Consoles around the bridged flickered and switched to battle mode. The engine core rose to full potential.
"Route all important stuff to my first mate. Institute Reduced Crew Procedures, and make one up for two crew."
"First mate, Admiral?"
"He’s sitting at Resource Allocation."
"Yes, sir. I have a two-crew procedure. Do you wish me to compile a new one?"
"No. Use that one."
"Aye, sir. Reduced Crew Procedures in effect. The Quat-lat Kay-ku vessel has left orbit, and appears to be vectoring for a clear line of fire. Line of sight in twelve seconds."
"Las, wait to begin. I’m going to talk to them." He turned the ship to face the fleet, and answered the hail from the biggest ship, a monster Paboosht vessel, mother-ship class, bigger even than the Lasiter, showing much damage and repair patching.
"This is Keelic Travers of the Ermolian Resistance Force."
Shields throughout the fleet flickered on.
Keelic continued, "You will surrender now, and release all captives to us," and touched off the channel.
To his friend he thought, If the Nova-Lance tries to get away, we follow it no matter what.
Dark-blue affirmation.
The Paboosht ship responded. A bearded man’s face appeared in the holo, and he said, "Where is Lord Kua?"
Keelic smirked in derision. "Lord Kua is running for his life to the shuttle bays of my ship."
The man’s eyes narrowed.
Keelic said, "If you don’t send some shuttles out to pick him up, he will fall to pieces." Keelic cut out their visual of him and replaced it with the IDS screen showing Jaw and hundreds of others jogging down a corridor, zapping cracks hounding them.
"You will stand down all of your ships immediately." Keelic cut the communication.
The Quat-lat Kay-ku vessel was coming in fast with no sign of slowing. Keelic threw himself into the image through the interface and found it vastly better than the simulator, confusingly so.
Fear fought anger for dominion inside him. This was no simulation. There were real people on those ships. People who had killed Anny, and taken his parents from him. People who wanted him dead.
The Quat-lat Kay-ku vessel was close, and Keelic targeted it with the interface and shouted, "Engage!" A hundred beam cannons opened fire, stabbing the other vessel’s shield.
Their shield took the strike, merely turning gray where the beam lances had hit. The prow of the enemy ship released a long shower of pinpoint lights that vectored at Keelic’s vessel just under the speed that would set off the anti-luminal mines.
Keelic screamed, "Evasi
ve!"
The display whirled, and the ship accelerated out of the minefield.
"Don’t hit light speed!" said Keelic. "There are mines."
"Understood, Admiral. We will not outrun the enemy weapon strike."
"Aft torpedoes fire!"
The ship lurched forward as the aft torpedoes fired, but the Quat-lat Kay-ku vessel danced aside. The swarm of pinpoint weapons caught up with the rear of the Lasiter, and detonated in an overlapping wave of antimatter plasma that rolled up and over the ship. Booming shudders sounded through the hull. Sensors were overwhelmed. The shield was getting pummeled to nothing.
The ship surged forward into translight, shoving Keelic violently into the padding of the chair, and he blacked out.
Someone was pulling him awake, shining bright worried colors in his eyes.
Keelic snapped aware and sat up. Before he could ask, he knew from Thotti that they were under full power with the pirate fleet in pursuit. Sensor probes fired beyond the translight barrier showed that the Quat-lat Kay-ku vessel was gaining on them, but the rest of the fleet was getting left behind. The vessel in pursuit was staying out of a direct chase path, thereby avoiding an easy torpedo strike from the aft tubes.
The holo display was dark, then flickered on as a probe went out, showing that the Quat-lat Kay-ku were not launching translight probes of their own. They had translight scanning ability. All the old Quatie ships used translight probes. Those antimatter torpedoes were different, too. That ship was new.
"Admiral," said Las, "the Vetry Field generator is in severe need of maintenance. Currently there is a two-millisecond reactive delay, and degradation of ten percent in the field’s effective stabilization curve. This will cause you to feel some discomfort during extreme maneuvers."
"Why didn’t you tell me that before?"
"You did not ask to see the damage report."
"Oh. Well, tell me now."
Las displayed an endless-looking list until Keelic said, "Wait. Will any of that make it so we can’t fight?"
"Sir, a primary power conduit in section 9B5 is severed. Power has been rerouted for the affected sections downstream; however, there is insufficient power to charge beam weapons twelve through eighteen. I have adjusted my firing pattern to compensate, resulting in an overall thirty percent coverage reduction for those vectors.
"The engine core has acquired a negative polarity. This causes the downstroke of the power-generating cycle to stress the structural integrity of the core housing. In the event of a core housing failure, the vessel may be destroyed. I recommend operations at two-thirds power until the core is depolarized."
"Will it still work at full power?"
"Affirmative."
The Quat-lat Kay-ku ship was getting closer. There was a ship chasing him that was catching up, and Keelic had never heard of anything that could catch a Lasiter in translight. He wanted all the power he could get.
A Quat-lat Kay-ku ship. The enemy of the entire Milky Way galaxy. He thought about what that meant. It wasn’t real, somehow. The display faded as the most recent sensor probe went out of range.
He took a deep breath and said to himself, "I’ve trained for this."
Louder, he said, "Las, I want a full ATS. You know that, right?"
"Aye, Aft Torpedo Spread."
"’Kay. On my mark. Fire a sensor probe just after it."
"Yes, Admiral."
"Mark!"
The ship shifted a fraction on course and lurched forward as a torpedo launched. The holo display flashed to life with data and showed the other vessel swerving to avoid the torpedo, beam weapons arcing in to vaporize the projectile.
A second launch moved the ship, then tubes three through eight lit off in quick succession. Last, nine through twenty launched in a bracketing group pattern.
The torpedoes met concentrated point fire or flickered harmlessly past the enemy ship as she maneuvered. One torpedo of the last group smacked into the ship’s bow as it turned, and Keelic tried to leap out of the seat roaring relief and joy. The chair’s tensile-web held him down.
Bright violet joy flowed through Keelic. He felt for the first time a sense of immense power. His own and the ship’s. This was far better than the simulator.
"Slow to nominal, bring us about and..." He halted in midsentence as the other ship stopped tumbling, and took up the chase once more. "No, cancel that."
The enemy was minus a large piece of their ship where the torpedo had passed through the nose. The damage was extensive, but not disabling. And now they were mad. He didn’t know how he knew that, but he felt it. There was only one sure way to win against a superior foe with a Lasiter. Do what she was built for—attack.
"Sweep-n-Roll, Las—do it now!"
The ship turned in a hard arc, the maximum possible while maintaining translight velocity—the sweep. The enemy ship took the bait, and turned to intercept, catching up very, very rapidly.
The Lasiter dropped out of translight and rolled on her long axis, firing a torpedo pair from each of her four short "wings." The Quat-lat Kay-ku changed course with incredible maneuverability four times, once for each set, causing the ship to drop to nominal speed. Las had meanwhile oriented to charge the oncoming ship, roaring in behind her torpedoes on a collision course.
The engines surged to keep the frigate from decelerating as the six primary tubes launched in quick succession. Between starships, the range was point-blank. The other ship swerved desperately and returned fire with what was left of the grid on their prow. Streams of pinpoint lights flowed out at Keelic’s ship.
His torpedoes reached the enemy. One obliterated the enemy shield, and another blew off their sweeping stern. The other bracketing torpedoes flew past, unneeded.
Spewing a cloud of charged particles and debris, the Quat-lat Kay-ku vessel tumbled out of control on the same vector as its last maneuver.
Keelic grabbed for the edge of the Command panel as hundreds of the enemy’s torpedoes swarmed through point defenses designed for weapons of a prior era. His ship shuddered under the impact. The shield held. Las closed with the enemy vessel and dissected what was left with beams.
They had no time to savor the victory, as warning tones sang. The pirate fleet dropped out of translight in twenty battle groups arranged in wide-array formation. Four inner groups, composed of heavy cruisers arranged at the points of a three-dimensional equilateral triangle, turned inward toward the frigate.
Thotti told Keelic that the aft tubes were ready to fire, and the forward had three minutes to firing capacity. They could speed that up by turning down the beam weapons, but Keelic said no to that.
"Get ready," he said. He hailed the fleet. "Ready to give up?"
The same bearded man appeared in the holo. "I did not authorize the attack. Where is Lord Kua?"
There was new respect in the man’s voice.
Keelic sent the fleet an image of the shuttle locks. Masses of bodies were stacked against the aft walls. Struggling and shifting, people were extracting themselves from the piles in the low gravity.
A corner of the man’s mustache lifted, exposing yellowed teeth.
Keelic told him, "We want all the prisoners. You have five minutes."
A hail of torpedoes and missiles flashed from the attack groups.
The display spun and Keelic was smacked into the seat. All four clouds of torpedoes passed through the area where the frigate would have been had they held vector and speed. Keelic was impressed with Las’s initiative, and grateful.
"Isolate them, Las! Keep us away from concentrations. Fire everything!"
Keelic slid hard into the starboard side of the convex Command chair. He struggled to watch the holo display swirl, then remembered the interface, and closed his eyes. The battle took shape around him in a lattice of beams in white, purple, green, and yellow pocked with a continual flickering of detonations and expanding bubbles of roiling plasma. Keelic’s ship was the moving center of a three-dimensional maelstrom of enemy battle
groups and torpedo swarms.
"Vector out!" cried Keelic.
Las swapped course and smashed into an enemy formation looking like an aquamite gone berserk, all guns on continuous fire. She gutted dozens of ships in her passing, then they were through the group, facing more.
Behind them, as what was left of the battle group gave chase, all twenty aft torpedoes fired. They found their marks, filling that region of space with blooming bubbles of luminous gas.
Thotti reported little shield degradation as yet from all the beam and small-yield torpedo hits. Nothing the pirates had seemed as effective as the Quat-lat Kay-ku torpedo swarm.
The ship lurched and boomed from a big dense-matter torpedo that had slipped past the point defenses. They changed vector and accelerated, plowing through another group, then another, Las taking them into the heart of groups with the fewest big ships. Keelic wondered at this flying into the center of battle groups until he saw how enemy ships hit their own as other vessels fired into the melee. Closing with the enemy shielded them from more attacks. The boom and shudder of the occasional high-yield torpedo strike became a splatter, then a rain. Keelic couldn’t believe it, but the shields were holding. Never in the simulator had he seen the vessel take so many strikes.
Continuing to accelerate, they plowed through group after group, leaving a wake of ravaged vessels.
After another sickening lurch, Thotti told Keelic that the shield had buckled under that hit, but had been re-formed with aft torpedo tube power. Keelic saw that they were taking the worst hits from the big vessels of each battle group that could withstand the Lasiter’s beam strikes.
"Target large vessels," he said, and Las changed course, launching three main-gun torpedoes into a battleship, vectoring hard to avoid ramming its fracturing hulk. Another vector change, and another to avoid collision again with a ship gutted by particle beams. Space was getting thick with hard-edged debris, and still the pirates came on.
Looking for enough open space to go translight, Keelic said, "We should be free."
He zoomed out the interface, revealing the true scale of Jaw’s fleet. This wasn’t simply a big pirate fleet. This was an invasion fleet.
Battle groups farthest from him winked out only to appear in front of the Lasiter, keeping the dreadnought always inside their fleet, and closing any gap that would provide a translight escape. They were reconfiguring, as well. Smaller ships were streaming away and new battle groups of heavy-class vessels were forming, coming in.
"Fire all forward torpedoes!"
The ship lurched backward.
"All beams forward, now!"
Keelic counted, one, two, three, then screamed, "Translight!"