Angles of Attack (39 page)

“Status report,” Colonel Aguilar barks when we reach the CIC. “What the hell is going on?”

The tactical officer by
Regulus
’s situation table is white as a bedsheet. “Sir, we got an emergency signal from the picket we passed on the way in.”

I know precisely what the tactical officer is about to say, and from Colonel Aguilar’s pained little groan, I know that he does, too.

“
Barroso
is destroyed.
Odinn
is damaged and on the way back to Earth. Sir, they have Lankies on their tail. They must have followed us all the way from the transition point.”

“How much time do we have before that seed ship gets here?” Colonel Aguilar asks.

“Four hours, thirty-five minutes.”

“How the hell did we not see them in our wake?” Lieutenant Colonel Decker asks. He looks like he wants to either punch something or throw up, possibly both at the same time. The
Regulus
’s CIC is awash in conversation at a noise level that is unusually undisciplined for a carrier’s nerve center, but considering the circumstances, I’m surprised it’s not complete chaos in here.

“Because they’re stealthy sons of bitches who don’t show up on radar. Because you can only pick them up on optics at short range if you know just where to look. Because we were hauling ass at full burn and blinded our own wakes,” Major Archer says. “Doesn’t matter right now, does it? They’re here.”

“Or they will be,” Colonel Aguilar says, and looks at his chrono. “In four and a half hours.”

“We need to get all the troops and civvies off the flight deck and down to Earth,” Lieutenant Colonel Decker says.

“They have little chance on the ground against those things,” I say.

“They have no chance at all sitting in that hangar while those things shoot us to pieces, Sergeant,” he says sharply.

“We have four drop ships in that hangar,” Sergeant Fallon interjects. “Get ’em warmed up and start hauling people down to Earth, right?”

“A round-trip from orbit takes a Wasp seventy minutes under ideal conditions,” Colonel Aguilar says. “Thirty people at a time. Forty or maybe fifty if we ignore every single safety regulation and risk a few broken bones. With only four ships—”

“We’ll get less than a third of them out of here,” Major Archer finishes.

The lightbulb that goes off in my brain is about the size and brightness of a tactical nuclear explosion. I have to restrain myself from bouncing up and down in a very undignified manner, but the idea that just popped up in my head makes for a better sudden high than a whole tube of Corpsman Randall’s magic painkillers swallowed all at once.

“How many drop ships can
Regulus
receive and launch at the same time?” I ask.

“She’s built for large-scale planetary assault, son,” Colonel Aguilar replies. “We can launch thirty-two drop ships simultaneously. But we don’t have those.
Midway
is already using hers for evacuating her own regiment. They’ll never be done on time.”

“I know where we can get a whole bunch of drop ships,” I say.

“Admit it,” Sergeant Fallon says in a low voice as we stand a way from the CIC pit to give the command crew space at the comms consoles. “You just came up with that so you can boff your cute little fiancée one last time before the world ends.”

“Shut the fuck up,” I reply. “No disrespect intended, ma’am.”

“No reply from Luna Control, sir,” the comms officer says. “It’s like nobody’s picking up. What the hell is going on over there?”

“I’m getting zip from the relay. Anyone know what kind of network the Combat Flight School birds are tied into?” the comms officer says.

Colonel Aguilar curses softly.

“We’re running out of time,” Major Archer says.

“XO, call flight ops,” the colonel says. “Tell them to get one of the Wasps ready. And tell them to do the fastest preflight they’ve ever done in their lives if they want to see another sunrise over Earth.”

Then he turns toward us.

“You,” he says to Sergeant Fallon. “
Héroe de guerra
. Take the staff sergeant here and a platoon of good troops. Race over to Luna and claim every single drop ship in the Flight School hangar on my authority as the acting commander of what’s left of the fleet. Anyone tries to stop you, shoot them twice.”

“Aye-aye, sir.” Sergeant Fallon grins.

The deck crews have already hauled the empty Wasp out of its parking spot and over to the refueling station when Sergeant Fallon and I arrive back on the flight deck at a run. Two thousand sets of eyes are on us when we come through the access hatch, with the older and slower staff officers a little behind us, still catching up in the passageway.

“Sergeant Benoit!” Sergeant Fallon shouts, and one of the NCOs standing near the tail ramp of our repurposed headquarters Wasp snaps to attention.

“Yes, ma’am!”

“Get first platoon of Alpha ready on the triple, full battle rattle. Two minutes,” she shouts.

“Yes, ma’am,” he shouts back. Behind him, in the nearby makeshift berthing area, the troopers of First Platoon, Alpha Company, are already springing into action without having to have the order relayed to them.

Behind us, the deck crew are pumping fuel into the Wasp as fast as the refueling unit will let them. I have a brief but intense flashback to another hasty refueling, this one on the flight deck of the doomed
Versailles
five years ago, shot full of holes and careening into the atmosphere of the colony planet Willoughby, Halley running through all the preflight motions with grim and focused efficiency.

The grunts are ready in a minute and a half. They assemble on the flight deck in front of Sergeant Fallon, armor sealed, helmets on their heads, rifles slung in front of their chests.

“Not bad for a shifty bunch of fucking slackers,” she says. “Now get on board. We have a few dozen drop ships to steal.”

The pilot wastes no time getting up to full throttle right out of the docking clamp. He banks the ship to port even before we’re all the way out of
Regulus
’s artificial-gravity field, and the troopers in the back hoot and holler like we’re on the way to some long-anticipated sporting event.

Outside, in the stretch of space between Luna and Earth, our task force has begun to segregate. The SRA ships have assumed their own formation around the carrier
Minsk
, and the NAC ships have taken protective positions around
Regulus
and
Midway
. Our drop ship banks again, this time to starboard, to avoid running into the hull of the frigate
Tripoli,
which has taken up station in the shadow of
Regulus
’s hull.

“ETA eleven minutes,” the pilot says into the ship’s intercom. “Still no reply from Luna Control.”

Next to me, Sergeant Fallon holds up her wrist and shows me the chronometer she has strapped to the outside of her armor. The little screen shows “04:21:33.”

“Four hours, twenty minutes until the end of the world, Andrew,” she says. “This may well be the day we both cash in our chips for good.”

“You believe in an afterlife?” I ask, and she laughs.

“Nice thought, but no. Although there are some I wouldn’t mind. That Viking shit. Valhalla?”

“Where the brave go when they die,” I say. “Fight all day, feast all night.”

“That doesn’t sound so bad. Hope they sort me into that one, not the flaming purgatory shit.”

“I think you have the entrance requirements licked for Valhalla,” I say, and outline an imaginary medal ribbon around my neck.

“That stupid thing,” she says. “I didn’t get that for being braver than everyone else that day. I got it for not being dead like everyone else.”

We coast over the huge fleet complex on Luna’s surface at a speed that’s most definitely well above regulation. Combat Flight School has its own little spaceport facility, with hangars for their training ships, and it’s as large as the main spaceport on New Svalbard. Our pilot comes in hot over the base’s large VSTOL pad, puts the skids down, and initiates the automated docking sequence, all without bothering to ask for air/space traffic-control clearance. We rumble through the airlock into the cavernous drop-ship hangar of the fleet’s Combat Flight School, where every aspiring pilot of any combat spacecraft learns the ropes. Inside, there are rows and rows of ships in different sections: Wasps, Shrikes, a few Dragonflies, and two or three designs that are either too old or too new for me to know, because I’ve never seen them in the fleet.

There are maintenance crews milling about on the hangar deck, and some of them look rather alarmed when the tail ramp of our drop ship opens to disgorge thirty HD troopers in battle armor and with weapons slung across their chests. Some of the deck hands hurry out through the nearest access hatches as Sergeant Fallon’s troops spread out around the drop ship.

“Well, there’s no shortage of rides here,” Sergeant Fallon says.

“You,” I holler to a pair of deck personnel in mechanics’ overalls standing nearby and looking indecisive at this unusual display. “Go and get whoever’s in charge here. And hurry the fuck up.”