First Principles: Samair in Argos: Book 3 (23 page)

              “Badly?”

              “I’m not sure, Captain, but both he and Stella seem to think so.”

              He sighed.  “All right.  I’m going to catch the next shuttle back up to the ship.”  He cut the connection.  Turning back to the group, he tried to put on a happy expression.

              “What is it, Captain?” Quesh asked, looking up from the datapad.  At Vincent’s hesitation, he frowned.  “Captain, what?  Don’t pretend like it’s nothing.”

              He sighed.  “Apparently we have a ship inbound.  A damaged ship.”

              The Parkani blinked.  “So that’s it?  A damaged ship heading this way?  Any more information from our people?”

              Vincent shook his head.  “No, just that.  I’m going to need a shuttle back up to the ship, Quesh.  If we’ve got someone coming this way, then I need to be back up there.”

              The Parkani scowled.  “Damn it, Captain.  We’ve just gotten the scheduling sorted out.  If I divert a shuttle for you now, it’s going to throw everything off.”

              “You’re going to have to deal,” Vincent told him.  The Parkani flung his arms in the air in frustration and stormed off, swearing to himself.  Three of the city workers dove out of the way as the hulking engineer moved past.  They could hear him blustering after he pushed out the main door of the conference room and headed out of the building.  “He’ll be fine.  And he’d better figure out a way to get me a shuttle back up to the ship.”

              “You’re not concerned about that, Captain?” Ka’Xarian asked, flicking his antennae.

              “You are?”

              Xar hissed.  “No, Captain, I suppose not.  But he is right about the schedules.  We have an opening to bring you back to the ship in forty-eight hours.  Couldn’t you wait until then?”

              “No, Xar, I can’t.  I know that the big girl isn’t a speedy warship and I also know that if George is reporting it, the ship must be pretty far out.  But something might happen and there might be a need to move quickly.  And I can’t
do
that from down here.  Sorry, Xar, but you need to brave the Chief’s wrath and get a shuttle loose.”

              “You’re the boss, Captain.  But shouldn’t
you
be the one braving the Chief’s wrath?”

              “Stop being such a coward, Xar.  Besides, I already gave him the order and then he stormed off.  It’s now up to you, as my Assistant Chief Engineer, to get in there and make sure he does it.  And if one doesn’t become available in an hour, then I will go and yell at him again.”

              Eventually, a shuttle was shaken loose, much to the severe and loud grumblings of the
Grania Estelle
’s Chief Engineer, and within an hour, Vincent was off planet and back aboard the bulk freighter.  As soon as he exited the cargo shuttle and his boots hit the deck, he was moving rapidly in the direction of the bridge.  “Talk to me Stella,” he said, moving as fast as he could.  Luckily, the corridors of the ship were mostly empty, as half the cargo division and two-thirds of the Engineering division were down on the planet. 

              “We’re still tracking it, Captain,” she said, her voice coming from the overhead, moving as he did through the corridors.  “We don’t have any other information as yet, only that they’re streaming a heavy neutrino signature.  The power emissions are quite low as well; George thinks it’s a ship considerably smaller than we are.”

              “Okay,” he said, stepping through the hatch of one of the multipurpose rooms and continuing on.  “But that doesn’t say much.  This ship has been bigger than every other ship we’ve come across in the Cluster for as long as I can remember.”

              “That’s true enough,” Stella admitted.  “So I guess that assessment doesn’t really help at all, does it?”

              Vincent chuckled.  “No, not really.  Can we make an educated guess as to its class?  Warship?  Freighter?”

              “Unfortunately no,” she replied.  “It’s still too far out.  It’s only barely on the edge of my sensors.  Right now I can only really tell you that it is a ship, I can detect the neutrino damage, but that’s about it.  I can’t tell size or power output yet.  It’ll be a few hours before I can get you more detail.  Honestly, Captain, I hate to say this, but I think Quesh was right.  You really could have waited for the shuttle opening.  You didn’t need to rush back up here and disrupt his schedules.”

              Vincent smirked.  “Yeah, well, he’ll get over it.  Besides, something might change and who knows what could have happened in forty-eight hours?  I wasn’t going to risk being stuck on the ground when that ship came into range.  I trust George to keep an eye on things for me, but this is
my
ship.”

              “Understood, Captain,” the AI said.  “I’ve got my sensors trained on that spot.  The instant I have anything more, George and I will let you know.”

              “Thank you, Stella,” he said.  A few more minutes and he stepped onto the bridge.  “Report,” he ordered.

              “Nothing new, Captain,” George said.  “Stella was piping your conversation up here.  We’re watching it.  Oh and all systems are in the green, Captain.  Ship is ready for space, if we decide we’re going to leave the crew and shuttles down on the surface.”

              “I’m hoping it won’t come to that.  What can you tell me about the ship?  Is it moving quickly?”

              “No, Captain,” Stella replied.  “In fact it’s moving very slowly.  Speed is less than twenty-five.”

              He blinked, checking his display at his command seat.  “Damn, they’re barely moving at all.”

              “They aren’t accelerating, either.  I think she must have engine trouble.  Just gave enough of a burn on the engines to head in system and then shut them down.  They’re on a ballistic course.”

              George nodded slightly.  “And it looks as though they’re moving roughly in the direction of this planet.  Maybe they have enough engine power to adjust their course to bring them here.”

              “They’d better hope so.  Because I’m not risking all our lives going out after them,” Vincent said.  “We don’t know who they are.  It could be a trick.  Or a trap.  And we’ve had enough ‘fun’ with pirates lately that I have no desire to play again.”  He continued to watch the indicator on the display as it crawled across the inner system ever closer to the
Grania Estelle
.

              Brianne Crgann, rocky-skinned Secaaran, Commander of the Republic Navy destroyer
Horus
, sat in her command seat on the bridge of the warship.  They were cruising along in hyperspace, the only surviving ship of the picket forces of Byra-Kae, heading for any sort of safe harbor.  She tapped her blocky forefinger against the arm of her chair, while she studied the most recent engineering report. 
Great.  More problems.  I suppose I should be happy that the old boy managed to do so well in the battle, but I can’t believe we’re to come so close to a possible sanctuary only to fail.
  The engines were running as hot as they dared, but they had fuel leaks, hull breaches, and so many dead, it was taking everything her crew had to keep the ship flying on the correct course, much less easing into a safe system.

              Brianne, of course, had no way of knowing if the Heb star system would be safe.  The pirate lord Verrikoth and his flotilla had not flown in from that direction.  Sensors had extrapolated their course had been from Ulla-tran, but she had no idea what actually awaited them in Heb.  It might be a font for pirate activity, for all she knew.  That was unlikely, that a pirate base would be less than five light years from Byra-Kae, but perhaps another ship was awaiting them there. 
Horus
was just barely flying; he was in no shape to take on another pirate ship in any kind of fight.  His expendable munitions were nearly completely gone, most of her energy weapons were offline, shields barely covered the whole ship; in short,
Horus
was a mess.

              Her comm panel beeped.  She pressed the control.  “Captain here.”

              “Captain, it’s Petty Officer Realt,” a young man answered.  “She’s regained consciousness.  The Commodore is asking to speak with you.”

              “Is there any change in her prognosis?” Brianne asked, concerned.

              “No, no serious changes, ma’am,” Realt asked.  The young man was acting as a medic for the injured on the ship when sickbay took horrendous damage.  He was not well trained in medicine; in fact he’d barely passed his basic first aid quals.  Unfortunately, he was the best trained crewmember who could be spared to care for the wounded aboard the ship.  The entire medical staff had been killed in the attack and Realt was doing the best he could to help.  “But she seems a bit stronger.  And she’s asking for you to come down and report.”

              Brianne nodded.  “Very well.  I’ll be down directly,” she said and cut the connection.

              The short walk to the Commodore’s stateroom brought Brianne to the woman’s bedside in just a matter of seconds.  “Ma’am,” Brianne asked, taking up a position on the side of the bed.  “How are you feeling?”

              Theodosia McConnell looked like hell.  She had been thrown from her seat when the ship had taken a particularly vicious hit and had crashed against the bulkhead, shattering her left arm.  She’d been taken off the bridge and was being carried to sickbay when another missile hit the destroyer amidships and tore into the hull.  She’d been caught in the explosion, which caused serious internal damage and crushed her legs.  The yeoman who had been carrying her was killed instantly and she’d lain there for nearly an hour before someone was able to come and get her.  Somehow, the breach in the hull had been sealed and she hadn’t suffered vacuum exposure on top of everything else, but without proper medical facilities or even a proper doctor, there was only so much that could be done.  How Petty Officer Realt had managed to keep the Commodore alive, no one seemed to know.  He had his nose in the medical journals and had somehow managed to keep her from bleeding to death for the three weeks.  If they managed to get to a proper medical facility, it would take a hell of a lot of work for a full trauma team to restore the woman, but once this was all over, Brianne was determined that the man would receive a medal for his efforts.

              The woman looked over at her flagship captain and grimaced.  “I feel like hell, Brianne,” she said, her voice a croak.  “And I know that I look like hell too.  So save your sympathies.  You have a ship to save, far more important people than me.”

              “That’s not true, ma’am,” the Secaaran replied.  “You’re the ranking officer.”

              “No, Brianne,” she disagreed.  “You are the ranking officer.  I’m not getting out of this bed anytime soon.  What’s our status?” she finally asked after a long pause.

              Brianne sighed.  “Not great, ma’am.  We lost a third of the crew in the battle and another eleven, including you, are down with injuries.  I know that Petty Officer Realt has been doing his best, but he’s overwhelmed.  And I have almost no one to spare to help him.  The remainder of the crew is doing everything they can to either try and repair our damage or keep the ragged systems running.  Six compartments on the port side are open to space.  We’re managing to hold our hyperspeed at Red level seven, and I
think
we can make it to Heb.  But it’s going to be a very close thing, ma’am.”

              “Anything the Chief can do?”

              “Not with the parts we have on board, ma’am.  We were due for a supply shuttle, scheduled for later in the day of the attack, so everything is low.  Spare parts, fuel, food, medical supplies, though since sickbay’s gone, that hardly mattered.”  Brianne looked down.  “It’s actually can be looked at as a good thing that we have so many casualties, ma’am, because if we were still operating at full crew levels, we wouldn’t have enough rations to go around.”

              McConnell snorted, then winced.  “Small favors, I suppose.”

              Brianne nodded, looking up.  “Once we reach Heb, we’re going to have to make our way in system.  It’s going to be a several day trip in, and unfortunately, our hyperdrive systems are going to take some work.  If it fails, we don’t have the parts to get it running again.”

              “What does the Chief say?”

              “She’s been bitching for days about crappy equipment and exhausted crews, ma’am,” she answered.  “Just like the rest of the officers.”

              “I see.  Well, like I said, you’re the ranking officer now, Brianne,” the commodore replied.  “I know you’ll be able to get us through… this…”  Her eyes were fluttering and a few of the machines started beeping.

              An instant later the petty officer was in the room.  He checked the readouts.  “She’s losing consciousness, ma’am.”  He let out a deep breath.  “Honestly, Commander, I think you should go.”

              She nodded.  Stepping back out of the way, she saw him increase the morpha drip and the commodore suddenly went limp on the bed, her eyes sliding shut.  “Get better, ma’am,” she whispered and then turned and walked out the door.

              After what felt like an eternity of stress and worry, the pilot turned to Brianne at his seat on the bridge.  “Skipper, we’re one minute from breakout into the Heb system.”

              She sighed.  “Thank the stars.”  She pressed a control, activating the ship’s PA system.  “All hands, this is the Captain.  We are finally approaching the hyper limit.”  There were gasps of excitement from the other bridge hands, though they would have known to the second how long it would take for them to cross the void from Byra-Kae to Heb.  Hearing the Captain say it somehow made it more real.  “Prepare for breakout.  Then we just have the haul across the system.  I know how hard all of you have been working to make it here.  We just need to hold on for a little while longer.  Crgann out.”

              “Approaching hyper limit, Captain,” the pilot reported.

              “Disengage hyperdrive, helm.  Engage for sublight.”

              There was a noticeable jolt as the ship exited from faster than light travel, and the sensors registered a burst of tachyon particles surging outward in a visible wave for a short distance from the shield bubble. 

              “Report.”

              “We have breakout,” the pilot replied.  “Shield strength is holding at fourteen percent.”

              “No additional damage suffered in the breakout,” the sensor officer reported.

              “Thank you, Lieutenant Klieg,” Brianne said.  “All right helm, nice and easy, set a course in system, heading for the habitable planet.”

              “Aye, Captain,” the man replied, diligently working his console.  “I have a course laid in.  We’re going to have to accelerate up to only twenty-five and then disengage engines.”

              “Twenty-five?” Brianne demanded.  “Why so slow?  This ship can handle up to five hundred.”

              “Yes, ma’am,” the pilot agreed.  “But with our damage and the amount of fuel we’ve lost, we can’t afford to go racing across the system.  If we keep the speed down it’ll obviously take a lot longer to get where we’re going, but we’ll have just enough fuel left to bring us into a stable orbit around the planet when we arrive.”

              She sighed, the sound came out like gravel being crushed.  “Very well.”  She waved her hand.  “Go ahead, helm.  Get us moving.”

              “Aye, Captain.”  A few more controls being worked and the ship shivered as the sublight engines kicked in.  Less than one minute later, the shiver went away.  “We’re moving at speed twenty-five.  Sublights powered down.  I’ll bring them up again as needed for course corrections.”

              “What’s our ETA?”

              A quick check, but then the man’s face fell.  “Nine days, seven hours, nineteen minutes.”

              Brianne stroked her forehead.  “Very well.  I’ll be in Engineering, speaking with the Chief.  Mister Klieg, you have the bridge.”

              “Aye, ma’am,” the zheen replied.  “I have the bridge.”

              Days later, Crgann was summoned to the bridge by a very excited zheen sensor officer.  Stepping into the command compartment, she looked to the lieutenant at the sensor station.  “All right, Klieg, what’s going on?”

              “We’re detecting the habitable planet, right where it’s supposed to be, ma’am,” the zheen replied.

              “That’s excellent,” she said, clearly not impressed.  “I hope you didn’t drag me up here in the middle of the ship’s night just to tell me that the planet is right where we’d expected it to be.”

              His antennae drooped.  “Uh, no Captain.  But we’re also detecting a ship in orbit.  A big one.”

              She frowned.  “A ship?  Show me.”  She stepped behind the zheen, looking at his displays.

              He pointed.  “Here, ma’am.  Whatever it is, like I said, it’s a big bastard.  But the power signature is too high for civilian, but a bit too low for military.”

              She tipped her head to the side slightly, staring at the display.  “Yes, you’re right about that.  But as far as we know, are there any ships out here in the Argos Cluster that big?”

              Klieg did a quick search in the ship’s database.  “Well, Captain, assuming that there are no pirate vessels that large, and I sincerely hope there are not…”

              “I second that,” the Secaaran agreed.
              “Then the only ship that matches what we’re showing is a civilian freighter, the
Grania Estelle
.  Came through Byra-Kae eleven years ago.  She’s a bulk freighter, been wandering around the Cluster for the last half century.”

              Brianne nodded.  “Well, I suppose that’s a good thing.  A ship that large, maybe they’ll have some reconditioned parts they could sell us.  Or maybe some food.”

              “Or medical supplies,” the pilot put in.

              “Right.  Open a channel to that ship.  We’re still a few light minutes away, but I want to let them know who we are.”  She stepped over to her command seat and sat down.  Pressing the command, she started to speak.

              “Captain, we’re receiving an incoming transmission from that ship,” Serinda stated.  She frowned.  “You need to hear this.  Actually, it’s video and audio.”

              Vincent gestured to the forward display.  “Put it up.”

              The main display changed from an overhead view of the city of Vanoria below to what appeared to be a control room of a ship, most likely a bridge.  A stone-faced figure of a Secaaran was front and center, but based on the uniform, it looked as though the ship was a Republic Naval vessel. 

              “This is Commander Brianne Crgann on the Republic Navy Destroyer
Horus
to the ship in orbit of the third planet in this system.  We are the last surviving Republic ship from the base at Byra-Kae.  We have severe damage and a great number of wounded.  We will be arriving in orbit of the planet in thirty-two hours.  Please, we have no hostile intentions.”  The female sighed.  “We are in desperate need of assistance.”  She hesitated for a moment.  “I hope to hear from you soon.  Crgann out.”

              Vincent sighed.  “Stella?  What do we have on that ship?”

              “Well, we’ve never actually encountered that before.  Even going through the databanks, all the way back to when my hull was originally built, we’ve never come across that ship before.  But it is carrying Republic markings and imbedded in the communication are clear Republic indicators.  The ship at least,
is
a Republic warship.  Whether what she’s saying is true…”  The AI shrugged.  “I don’t know, Captain.  I’d need to get in a lot closer and see what I can dig out of her mainframes.”