Accord of Mars (Accord Series Book 2) (10 page)

I
was
at long last back where I belonged. The chair underneath me was satisfyingly firm. I looked around the control room of the Hermes, which buzzed with quiet activity. I knew every face. Was intimately familiar with every nook. This was my domain, more than anyplace else in the universe.

The room had no windows. Too fragile for a combat ship, and useless for space combat anyway. Instead we had a massive holotank installed in the middle of the bridge, which created a three dimensional display of the area around the Hermes. Right now that track showed as clear. The moment we got word that the Earth fleet had left its dock we scrambled all civilian ships away from Mars Station. They’d wait the fight out in the asteroid belt until the shooting was done.

I had no doubts there would be shooting. The UN was calling their fleet a ‘show of force’ on the Earth newscasts. We broadcasted Thomas’s recording and some of the smaller news services had picked it up and played the damning track. But Choi’s people had quickly discredited the recording as a fake, and most of the major networks were parroting the party line.

For now, it was enough that everyone on Mars knew the truth. We knew what was coming. We knew that coming back under the UN yoke would be different from what we had enjoyed before. They would never again allow us the level of freedom we’d become accustomed to. Choi’s UN was prepared to revisit all of the worst offenses of the old colonial era on the new one.

It was up to us to teach them the same lesson that Earth’s European empires had learned centuries before. You attempt to rule your colonies with an iron fist at your own peril.

“Incoming call from Mars,” Lieutenant Harris said. He was my communications wizard, and had a steady laser comm link running to Mars Station. Despite our running radio silent, we had excellent eyes and ears out there.

“Put it through,” I said.

The small screen beside my chair blinked into life and George’s face appeared. He looked haggard. His face was worn and thin, and he had dark circles under his eyes.

“You look like hell, George. Are you even supposed to be out of bed yet?” I asked.

“Not according to my doctors,” he replied. “But my successor took off for deep space at the first sign of trouble, so I thought perhaps I should see what help I can offer.”

I frowned. “Tabby said she had things well in hand. And I need to be out here.” For more than one reason, I wanted to be on the sharp tip of the spear for this operation. There was no way I could ride this out on the surface.

“And we need you out there,” he said earnestly. “I’ll do whatever I can to support you on this end. I’ve informed Earth that I have resumed my office.”

“They haven’t turned around,” I observed.

“No. But then, we always knew it wasn’t just about you.”

It was about control. Whoever controlled the orbitals would control humanity. If Choi had all the armed spaceships under his command, he would have the ultimate authority over every person, on every world. No one would be able to oppose him. It’s what he tried to achieve with his ‘pirates’. And now he had his fleet - legitimately authorized by the nations of Earth. There was only one thing standing in the way of his utter control of space, and with it every human life.

Mars.

“Incoming ships on track!” Ensign Diaz said. We didn’t have active radar running right now - too easy to pick us up if we did, and we wanted to stay hidden. But we had excellent feeds from the Station radar. She updated the holotank from that information. Four contacts bearing for Mars, coming from the inner system. They’d gotten close before we picked them up when they began braking to slow down.

“George, going to need to cut this short. Company coming,” I said.

“Godspeed,” he said. He paused, looked away, then back at the screen. “Nick… I heard about Thomas. I’m so sorry.”

“So am I,” I said. More than I could ever put into words. How could a man ever apologize enough for giving the orders which killed his own son? I shoved the thoughts away with an effort that hurt my soul. This wasn’t the time or the place for them.

“Make them pay,” George spat out. “Make them sorry.”

I was surprised with his vehemence. But my heart agreed wholeheartedly with the sentiments. “Oh, we plan to.”

He cut the link. And it was time for me to get back to work.

“Who is in the alert fighters?” I asked.

“Flynn and her first squadron,” Harris said.

“Order them to launch. Silent running. I want those ships blasted to bits before they get a single message out.”

“Aye sir,” he replied. A few moments later the ship shook as four Hawk fighters burst free and took flight. “Hawks are away.”

“Put them on the plot,” I said. The holotank lit up with four small green points to represent the friendly Hawks. They boosted at twenty gravities, bearing down on the four decelerating red dots.

The Hawks were my gamble, my hope for winning this fight. We couldn’t out produce Earth when it came to building more fighting ships. Instead, we needed to outperform them. We needed to change the dynamic of space combat in a way that unraveled their advantage. So I had the Hermes built, and the Hawks, putting maximum priority over their construction over everything else.

The Hermes carried weapons, but it was primarily a carrier. The ship stored three fighter wings, twelve Hawks in all. Each of the Hawks was a tiny but deadly package. They had the newest engines I could provide, and the ability to accelerate faster than anything else in space. They were armed to the teeth with missiles of their own and equipped with the best stealth technology we could load on board. They couldn’t pack as many missiles as a larger ship, but they could strike like a knife in the dark.

“Can you get me more detail on those ships?” I asked.

“Working on it, sir,” Diaz replied. “Mars Station is saying they look like cargo vessels, but they aren’t transmitting an ID code, and they are not responding to their radio signals.”

I stood and walked to the holotank. They were definitely hostile. A civilian vessel would be replying. I backtracked their flight path in my head, trying to figure out where they’d come from. Somewhere in-system, but where? If Choi had a base out there it was important we find it. These were likely a few of the pirate vessels which had escaped the Battle for Earth all those months ago. Which meant they were armed.

“They’re a probe. Trying to see what defenses we might have in place,” I muttered.

“Hawk wing is closing on target,” Diaz said.

The green dots were swooping in with ever-increasing speed. The red dots continued to slow. Their course hadn’t altered. They were still headed directly for the station and would be within missile range in another minute. Not much time left for Flynn to take them out. If I had to, I could move the Hermes between the station and any incoming missiles and probably take them out. But doing so would expose the Hermes, which was precisely what Choi was trying to accomplish with this attack.

“Hawks are at fifty kilometers from target,” Diaz said. And closing. Even as she said it, I saw more lights appear on the board as Flynn’s fighters fired their own missiles. She’d cut it awfully close.

Her fighters veered away after firing their volley. The red dots saw the missiles and tried vainly to change their courses, but there wasn’t any time. The missiles were fast. Seconds after they’d been fired, they impacted.

The red dots vanished from the tank.

“Confirm those ships are destroyed,” I ordered.

There were a few moments of silence in the control room as everyone waited, hoping.

“Confirmed, sir,” Diaz said. “All four enemy ships are dust.”

Then the cheering started. I allowed myself a small smile and returned to my chair. Let Choi and his people chew on that for a while. With less than three seconds from the missile launch to the ships’ destruction, there was no way any of them had gotten a message out. All his people would know is that they sent in ships, and those ships vanished. Which was precisely the way I wanted it.

“Have the Hawks return to their roosts. And tell them well done,” I said.

It was a good start. But the real battle was still ahead.

T
he ship was decelerating gently now
. Maybe we were getting close to our destination at last? I shifted my leg, trying to work a cramp out of the muscles in my thigh. Moving even a little bit in the enclosed space of the missile pod was difficult. If I’d been alone in here it still would have been hard. Shift too much and I’d bang into one of the walls. While ships in space do occasionally make odd noises, repeated banging sounds from inside the compartment full of explosives would probably get somebody to come check things out.

Which was the last thing we wanted. So far no one had bothered looking into the compartment where we were tucked away. It had been two days, and I was feeling pretty good about our odds. If they were going to look, they would have by now. I was still being extra careful about making noise.

My leg bumped into Acres instead. He woke, snorting a little before opening his eyes.

“Is it my watch?” he asked softly.

“No, sorry,” I whispered back. “Was trying to stretch.”

“You woke me up for that?” he said. We were both keeping our whispers barely audible. Voices carried.

“Didn’t mean to,” I said.

“How much longer are we going to hide in here?” he asked.

I tapped my smartwatch to activate it again. The tablet battery was already dead, but the watch was a computer in its own right. I’d taken to turning it off to conserve what was left of its power, but over the last two days I’d managed to quietly hack a link into the ship’s main computer network. Now it could display whichever ship’s instruments I asked. I called up navigation. Like Acres, I was about done with hiding.

“You stink,” he said, grinning in good humor.

“We both stink.” But not as bad as the ration bags did. We’d finished the last of the food yesterday, and re-used the bags for waste. Ever try pooping in zero gravity? Ever try doing it into a bag? Now imagine living in the small space where you were storing the bag. It hadn’t been a pleasant trip.

I lived in ongoing fear that one of the water bags we’d reused for urine would snag on something sharp and rupture.

“That’s odd,” I said.

“What?”

“We’re not on a direct course for Mars.” The telemetry my watch was showing me was clear. The entire fleet was still on the move, but it was decelerating - a long way from Mars. I was tired, and it took me a moment to realize what else was out here that they could be headed toward.

“It’s the station,” I said. “They’re headed for Dad’s R&D station.”

When I left Mars most of the fleet was still out there at the not-so-secret-anymore station, under repairs. I didn’t know how many ships Dad had ready for action, but I assumed he’d pull anything flightworthy back to Mars to prepare for the attack. Earth must have assumed the same. They were going to try to blow the station and deprive Mars of most of our shipbuilding bays.

“They’re in for a rude shock, then,” Acres said. “The Old Man has so many missile satellites around that thing, even this fleet is going to take it in the teeth trying to get through.”

I gave him a small nod. I’d seen those missiles at work before. “Maybe this is the moment we’ve been waiting for,” I said. “We take the ship now, we can add to the confusion.”

“Kid, that works for me. I’ve been ready to get out of this tin can for days.”

We went over the plan quickly. We had two pistols each. They had no weapons. Acres would go aft to engineering. I’d go forward to the bridge. We guessed there would be two crew on each end, who should be easy enough for us to eliminate. Taking the ship should be simple. The trick was going to be doing it fast and quietly, before anyone on board could get a message out.

“We’re still decelerating,” Acres said. “That’s gonna be a climb.”

He was right. The engines were in the rear of the ship. To brake hard, the ship flipped around and fired its main engine. I figured we were braking at about a full gravity. There was a ladder to climb the central stem of the ship while we were moving. Acres would be climbing down, toward the engines. I’d be climbing up to get to the cockpit. It was a long way up.

“I’ll manage,” I said. What else could we do? If we let them get off even a single message, we were toast.

“Timing has to be just right,” he said. “Ping my watch with yours when you’re ready. I’ll be waiting.”

“You think so?” I said. “Old man, I think I can climb a ladder faster than you can.”

“Old, hmm? We’ll see.” He clapped me quietly on the shoulder. “Let’s do this.”

I drew a pistol and swung the hatch open, quickly peering out into the corridor. It wasn’t likely anyone would be in the central passage right now, but it was a concern. The way was clear. I swung out onto the ladder, trying hard not to look down. The passage was a hundred feet long, and I had about eighty of that to climb.

I slid the pistol back into a pocket. We’d ditched the space suits inside the missile container. It might be nice to have them for an emergency, but I’d never be able to make this climb suited. I was just wearing the tight ship suit we wore underneath.

The first few rungs were easy enough. I was in good shape. Maybe this climb wouldn’t be so bad. Acres swung out beneath me and started to descend the ladder. I looked down and saw him grinning up at me. He gave me a thumbs up, then went back to his climb.

I brought my attention back to the ladder. I still had a long way to go.

About forty feet along, my arms started to shake. I made the mistake of looking down. I was a good sixty feet above the bottom now. If I let go, I’d break myself in the fall. My fingers were getting sweaty, and hanging on was harder than I’d hoped. I pushed on anyway. The sooner I got this done the better.

It didn’t take long to reach the top, even if it felt like forever. There was a little crow’s nest at the crew end of the ladder. I eased my body out onto it as quietly as possible, trying hard not to make a sound. I wasn’t completely silent, but the engines were making enough noise, the ship shaking a little from the braking effort, that my quiet scrapes probably went unnoticed. I sucked down a few deep gulps of air and tried to wipe my slick palms dry on my pants. I never wanted to do that again.

Then I reached over and tapped the watch on my wrist. That was Acres’ signal. He’d be moving. Time for me to do this. I drew the pistol from my pocket and reached for the hatch into the cockpit.

It opened before I touched the handle.