First Principles: Samair in Argos: Book 3 (5 page)

              “I have no intention of leaving them,” Vincent told her.  “I’m just wondering what we can do.  This ship certainly can’t stand up to the battlecruiser, with what few weapons we even have.”

              Stella shook her head.  “No way.  I swore I wouldn’t go riding against death ever again.  Once was enough.”

              “You can say that again.  I’m a freighter captain, a businessman,” he said, leaning back in his chair.  “We’ve been making a living, such as it is, for years, plying the spacelanes.  We’ve dealt with the odd scrap or two, but the Argos Cluster has gotten far more dangerous, hell just in the last year.  And look where we are now.  A supposedly safe star system being attacked by the locals because they don’t like how I do business.”  He laced his fingers behind his head and looked up at the overhead.  He pursed his lips.  “Where’s Quesh, or Ka’Xarian?”

              Stella blinked.  “Quesh is in Main Engineering,” she reported.  “He’s on shift right now.  Xar is down in Cargo bay eight, working on the fighters.”

              He sat up, pulling out his communicator and flipping it open.  “Xar, it’s the Captain.”

              A moment’s pause.  “What can I do for you, Captain?  We’re busting our humps getting the new fighters done.  And may I say, they are beautiful.”

              He chuckled.  “I’m sure they are, Xar, but that’s not why I’m calling.”

              The captain could hear the zheen moving away from some loud noises.  “I’ll be right back.  Yeah, Captain’s on the line.  Just keep your comments to yourself.  I told you I’ll be right back!”  He was yelling to someone in the background that Vincent couldn’t hear.  “Sorry about that Captain,” Ka’Xarian said, as the ambient noise level in the background dropped dramatically.  “Moved out into the corridor.  So what can I help you with?”

              “Well, I’d love to get those fighters finished up and launched, but as Stella pointed out, even if they were ready to fly, we don’t have any pilots for them.”

              The zheen buzzed.  “No, Captain, we don’t.”

              “But apparently the battle is coming our way and Tamara and her forces might not be able to stop it.  We need to do something to help.”

              A pause.  “Well,
Grania Estelle
can’t fight the
Leytonstone. 
They’ll wipe the floor with us without even slowing down.”

              “That’s what I was thinking,” Vincent concurred.  “But we need something.  Even something small.”

              “Well…” the zheen said slowly.  “What about the shuttles?”

              “What about them?”

              “Give me a few minutes.  Cap, can you come down to the boat bay?”

              “Sure,” he said.  “I have some time before the
Leytonstone
gets here.”

              “See you there.”

              The comm clicked off.  Vincent met Stella’s gaze.  “Any idea what he’s up to?” he asked, getting up from the table.

              She smiled.  “Knowing him, it’ll be inventive and you won’t like it, but it might just work.”

              He chuckled, heading for the hatch.  “You’re right, I probably won’t like it.  But if it works, I’ll forgo the vicious tongue lashing he’ll probably deserve.”

              When Vincent arrived in the boat bay, Ka’Xarian was already there, steering a hover pallet that contained a one hundred liter drum of helium 3 and a squat, boxy device.  He looked up from what he was doing as the captain walked in.  “Captain, good.  I have your solution here.”  He gestured to the hover pallet.

              “A drum of helium 3?” Vincent asked.

              “That’s just the fuel source,” the engineer replied.  “This item here,” he said, patting the device, “is the real solution.”

              The captain grimaced.  “Xar, it’s been a long day that isn’t over yet.  Let’s pretend I’m just a starship captain and you’re one of my Assistant Chief Engineers.  Explain to me why this is the solution.”

              Xar chittered a laugh.  “Yes, Captain.  This here is a detonator.  I’ve had my team working on it since we got back from Heb.”

              “A detonator?  Which means what, Xar?”

              “Well, with the proper fuel source,” he patted the drum of helium 3, “it would be a helium 3 fusion bomb.”

              The captain froze.  “You built a bomb on my ship?”

              “I built a bomb with no explosive,” the zheen replied, sounding a bit defensive.  “It’s perfectly safe.  I wasn’t going to endanger anyone on the ship, Captain.”

              “You sure could have fooled me, Xar,” the captain fumed.  “What the hell is this doing on my ship?”

              “Well,” the zheen hesitated.  “I built it to assist in the mining operations.  Use it to crack some really big asteroids.”

              Vincent realized that his jaw was hanging open and he closed his mouth with a click.  But then he frowned.  “How did you build this?  I know for a fact that the replicators won’t build bombs.  Not without Samair’s authorization codes which I know she wouldn’t have given.”

              The zheen nodded.  “Yes, Captain, you’re correct.  I didn’t get this out of a replicator.  Or rather, I didn’t get all of the parts from there.  I did replicate a few of the parts and then just machined and assembled the rest by hand.  My team and I build six of these babies.  And they’re ready for deployment, just add fuel.”

              Vincent closed his eyes and took a long, deep breath.  “In the future, Assistant Chief Engineer Ka’Xarian, you will keep me informed of
all
dangerous materials you are working with on my ship.  If you fail to inform me and I find out, you will no longer be working on my ship.  Is that understood?  I will drop you off on the nearest oxygen world we come to and you will not be coming back.”

              Xar’s antennae drooped.  “Yes, Captain.  Sorry, Captain.”

              Vincent scowled at him for another long moment.  “Good.  Now, talk to me about these devices.  What’s the yield?”

              “Dialable,” Xar replied.  “From as low as five megatons to as high as fifty.  Clean explosion, fusion bomb.  No residual radiation.”

              “So we’ve got six high explosives, but no launchers.  What did you want to do with them?”

              “Well,” Ka’Xarian said, his antennae waving.  “I was thinking one of two things.  We load three of these each into two of our shuttles.  We hook up some sort of receiver so that Stella can fly them by remote and launch them toward the
Leytonstone
.  Stella does some evasive maneuvers to keep them from getting shot down and then plows them into the battlecruiser.”  He clapped his hands together.  “Boom!”

              “How long?” Vincent asked.

              “Twenty minutes to load and arm the devices,” Xar replied.  “And then another twenty or so to get the receivers in.  We’ve got a few sitting on the deck in Cargo bay eight from the maintenance bots we were stockpiling which should work.”

              “All right,” he said with a sigh.  “I hate to lose the shuttles, but anything we can do to save the ship…”  He nodded.  “All right, pull the team off of fighter construction duty and get to work on this.  If Quesh asks, tell him I told you to do it.  And Xar?”

              “Yes, Captain?” the engineer asked, turning his head to face his commander. 

              “Get everything loaded, but don’t start arming bombs in my boat bay until the last minute, please.  My ship is starting to run smoothly again.  I’d like to keep it that way.”

              Ka’Xarian nodded.  “Of course, Captain.  As one of the ones who is doing the work, I completely agree to that.”

              “All right, Captain,” Fayyad al Fakhir said over the comms, thirty-five minutes later.  “The braces are in place and locked down.  For a temporary fix, the ship is ready for high speed maneuvering.  I recommend you don’t push higher than eighty-five percent power, but otherwise this girl is ready to dance.”

              Tamara smiled.  “Very well done, Chief.  Thank you.  Keep me informed if anything changes.”  The comm clicked off.  “All right, helm, you heard the man.  Increase speed.  We’ve got to catch up to the
Leytonstone
before she gets too close to the Kutok mine.”

              “Can’t let the starfighters have all the fun, ma’am,” Garidhak pointed out, which caused some chuckles around the bridge.

              Tamara was among them.  “True enough, Guns.  Just make sure you’re ready to engage as soon as we’re close enough.”  She watched the display as the acceleration increased and saw the Time to Intercept indicator get cut from twenty-five minutes to twelve. 
Twelve minutes to fight against a battlecruiser, one that we haven’t appreciably damaged yet.  In a ship that has already taken some serious battering.  Stars, please give us the fortitude to see this through.

             
The
Cavalier
raced ahead, the sparrow chasing down the tiger.

              “One minute to weapons range, Captain,” Garidhak said.  “I’ve got their engines in my sights.”

              “Once we’re in range, unload with all available weapons, Guns,” Tamara ordered.  “We won’t get many chances with this.”

              “Understood.”  The Severite focused intently on her controls and her displays. 

              Tamara nodded slowly, her own eyes on displays.  The timer was running down for the time until the
Cavalier
would intercept.  Thankfully, the race to catch the larger ship put the
Cavalier
right in the
Leytonstone’s
stern, which gave her a beautiful shot right at their engines.  And she was going to make sure that Garidhak blasted them to hell and gone.  A disabled battlecruiser would be much easier to deal with than one that could still maneuver.  Of course, the problem with a disabled battlecruiser was that while her engines would be down, it didn’t arrest her momentum.  She’d continue barreling forward, barely able to alter vector using only maneuvering thrusters.  And on her current vector, she was headed straight for the Kutok mine.  Of course, following that thought to its logical conclusion, the ship would head straight into the mine and then straight into the atmosphere of the gas giant beyond.  It would be in the crew’s best interest to surrender so that FP tugs could latch on and pull her clear.  Maneuvering thrusters alone wouldn’t provide enough thrust to change the battlecruiser’s vector to avoid the planet unless they started firing now.  And they wouldn’t.

              “In range!” Garidhak crowed from tactical.

              “Fire!” Tamara barked.

              The remaining heavy laser cannons spat fire and missiles belched from the starboard tubes, arcing around to vector in on the battlecruiser’s exposed stern.  Explosions rippled across the after section, and two of the remaining propulsion units were shredded, leaving only one left functioning. 

              “Hit them again, Guns,” Tamara ordered, leaning forward slightly in her command seat. 

              Another salvo of heavy lasers tore into the after section, but the propulsion unit didn’t explode.  It was still functioning but was showing scars from the carbon scoring from the near misses.  All of the rest of the wrecked propulsion units were so much slag now.  They would need to be completely cut away and replaced once the ship was brought into a repair slip.  Or rather, a repair slip would need to be built to hold the cruiser and work on her.

              “Evasive,” Tamara said to Wymea.  “Those aft cannons are still shooting.”  The corvette jinked right just as a heavy laser blast tore through space nearby.  “Guns, you’ve been doing well, but save the missiles.  Cannons only.  Now get me that last propulsion unit!”

              “Aye, Captain,” the Severite said, stabbing a control.

              Colonel Gants pounded the right arm of his chair with his fist. 
This isn’t going the way it’s supposed to.  Don’t those jumped up freighter bums know when they’re defeated?  They would dare to challenge a battlecruiser with a swarm of gnats and a shoebox of a corvette?

              “Helm, alter course,” he ordered.  “Twenty degrees down and five points to starboard.”  That would slew the engines out of the direct line of fire from the corvette.  He couldn’t risk losing propulsion.  “Guns, open up on that damned corvette.  Ignore the fighters, just shoot down that ship!”

              “We’ll have to cancel shield recharge,” Paxton reminded him.

              He growled.  “Fine.  Do it.  Open fire with aft cannons, and when we change course, if we can, use the main batteries.”

              “Understood, sir,” the tactical officer replied, activating the ship’s weapons.

              Korqath flicked his antennae in frustration.  He’d lost another three of his fighters in just the last few moments.  Two of the Delphons had strayed too close to the after sections and the heavy cannons had been quick enough to blast them apart.  And one of his brave Aploras had been vaporized by a turbolaser shot when the main weapons started shooting again.  He simply was in the line of fire and hadn’t known it.  The battlecruiser’s guns opened up and fire engulfed his ship.  One second he was there, the next he was gone.

              It seemed Captain Samair had finally gotten her act together and closed the distance.  She’d savaged the battlecruiser’s engines but hadn’t so far been able to take them out completely.  And now the big bastard was turning again to try and keep
Cavalier
from cutting the legs out from under her completely.  Whether it would prove successful, the pilot didn’t know. 

              His forces, meanwhile, had been nipping at the battlecruiser’s shields, forcing them to expend energy in keeping them strong.  In more than a few cases, the strafing runs had weakened the ship’s defenses enough to cause spotting and the Aploras had managed to cause a small amount of damage to the ship’s hull.  They hadn’t tried to get a missile through; they’d been flying too fast for that.  His fighters had done little more than annoy the capital ship, but the constant shooting at the shields had been taking a toll on the cruiser’s power systems.

              But they weren’t
hurting
the bastard!  And too many of his pilots had already been lost for little more than harassment attacks.  He chittered his frustration.

              His comm panel beeped and he keyed it active.  “Korqath here.”

              “Leader, this is Captain Eamonn on the
Grania Estelle
.”  An unfamiliar voice sounded over the comms.

              “Yes, sir.  I’m afraid I’m a bit busy right now, sir.  Can this wait?”  Korqath dodged around a turbolaser that was trying to shoot the
Cavalier
.

              “No, Leader, it can’t,” the freighter captain and owner of FP replied.  “I’m not calling to waste your time.  I’ve launched two of my shuttles and loaded them up with explosives.  I need your fighters to either distract the battlecruiser so they can do their work, or escort them in.”

              It took a few seconds for what the captain said to process in Korqath’s brain.  A shuttle, no
two
shuttles loaded with explosives.  And he and his people needed to escort them in.  Or, they needed to distract the battlecruiser long enough for them to get close enough to do their thing.  All right.  “Copy that, Captain.  Tell your pilots that are in those shuttles that my Aploras will give them their opening.”

              “The shuttles are unmanned, Leader,” Eamonn said.  “They’re being flown by remote.”

              Korqath shook his head; that was a detail to be explored later.  “Understood, Captain.  Well then whoever is sitting at the remote better be ready.”  He cut the channel and switched back over to the squadron.  “Aploras, Delphons, this is Leader.  We have a pair of shuttles coming in from the
Grania Estelle
that have some big boom.  We’re going to give them a chance to get close enough to deploy.”

              “Yeah!” Hukriss yelled over the comms.  “Now we’re talking, Lead!”

              “Second flight, you will continue to harass the battlecruiser,” Korqath ordered.  “First flight, break off and vector on a course two-five seven mark nine.  That will move us back toward the shuttles and hopefully up and away from the cruiser’s forward weapons.  Just like before, First Flight, make sure you continue with evasive moves.  Break!”  Eight
Sepulcres
roared away from the cruiser, heading up and away, in the general direction of the gas giant and the mine, though if they continued their vector, they would just skim the northern polar atmosphere of the gas giant and out into deep space.  But Korqath had no intention of going that far. 

              “Half of the fighters area breaking off, Colonel,” Paxton reported.  “Got one!  Got another!” the tactical officer called out in glee. 

              “We’re still taking fire from the ones that stayed behind, Colonel,” the engineering watch replied.  “Shields are holding, but they’re losing strength.  No spotting yet, but it won’t be long.  And that corvette is still trying to get into position to shoot the remaining engine.”

              Gants nodded to himself, not really listening to the report.  He watched the screen, his eyes seeing only the corvette. 
That ship is the only real threat.  And it isn’t that much of one.  One good salvo and it will crack open like an egg. 
“Alter course,” he spoke up suddenly.  “Up six five degrees.  Once the main batteries have solution, target that corvette and destroy it.”  He grinned fiercely. 
I have you now.

              “
Leytonstone
is changing course,” Ykzann reported suddenly.  “They’re climbing.”

              “They’re trying to get us in the sights of their heavy batteries,” Tamara said.  “Mister Wymea, keep us in their baffles.”

              “Yes, Captain,” the man replied, adjusting the ship’s course.  Unfortunately, as he did so, the battlecruiser’s aft cannons caught the corvette and hammered them.  Three then four blows rained on the dorsal shields, battering the hull beneath.  The hull was blasted away in that section and atmosphere ignited inside, causing secondary explosions. 

              “Break off!” Tamara barked, clutching the arms of her chair in a white-knuckled grip.  “Drop us down the perpendicular axis to the battlecruiser and accelerate away.  We can’t fight them.”

              “Captain!” came al Fakhir’s voice over the comms.  “What the hell are you doing to my ship?” he demanded.

              “We’re breaking off, Chief,” Tamara said bitterly, grimacing.  “I tried to get clever and we got pummeled for it.”

              “Well, I’m glad we’re breaking off.  The central spine of the ship is nearly broken in half.  We’ve got only a few spars holding the ship together.  I’m going to have to reduce power to avoid strain on the remaining power conduits.  And you need to reduce acceleration.  Right now.”

              “Helm, reduce accel,” she ordered.  Checking her displays, she nodded.  They were out of range of the battlecruiser’s weapons, unless the ship turned and chased after them.  “In fact, cut accel to zero.”

              “Thank you, Captain,” the Chief Engineer replied.  “I’ll get to work trying to fix all this damage.  Thankfully, I don’t think we lost anyone this time.”

              Tamara grimaced.  “Well that’s some good news anyway.  Do what you can, Chief.  As soon as this is over, we’ll get teams from the
Grania Estelle
and the
Samarkand
to assist in repairs.”

              “Repairs?” al Fakhir demanded.  “Are you kidding me, Captain?  It’s going to take a full rebuild to fix all that damage.”

              “Understood, Chief.  Just keep us space worthy as best you can.”

              “Aye, aye, Captain.”  And he signed off. 

              “Is the battlecruiser changing course to chase us?” Tamara asked.

              “No ma’am,” Leicasitaj replied.

              “Very well.  You have the bridge, XO,” she said, getting up from her chair.  “Keep me informed of any developments.  But right now I’m going below to give the Chief a hand.”  And she turned and exited the bridge.

              The Romigani watched her go shaking his head in disbelief. 
That’s it?  After all her speeches, all the training and now, with the job not done, she just walks off the bridge?
  He turned back to the tactical display in front of him and studied the readouts.  There had to be something that they could do. 
Cavalier
wasn’t out of the fight just yet.

              Tamara stepped off the bridge went down the corridor a few meters, then leaned against the bulkhead.  Putting her hands on her knees she doubled over and tried to suck air into her lungs.  Things were not going as they were supposed to.  But what had she expected, anyway?  She was an engineer, not a combat officer.  She’d been going about this as though she was a master tactician, someone who had been on the command track in the Navy with a thousand battles under her belt.  The closest she’d ever been to a tactical officer, outside of the starfighter corps was serving as bridge engineering watch during her stint on the
Archimedes
, just after her transfer out of fighters.  But that was a
totally
different set of circumstances.  Fighting from a starfighter cockpit and fighting from the bridge of a warship were completely different ways of thinking and fighting.

             
I told him
, she raged. 
I told him I wasn’t the one to do this.  That bastard Eamonn browbeat me into taking this post, into running his little pet navy for him and now it’s all falling apart.  No.  I let him browbeat me into doing this.  Was it pride?  I wanted to show that there was no job too big for me.
  She let out of wry laugh. 
Look how well that worked out.

             
Tamara sighed, pulling herself up to a more upright standing position. 
Stop feeling sorry for yourself.  There are people counting on you.  You’re the damned Captain of this ship! 
She scrubbed her hands over her face, then shook her head to clear it.  She felt a little better.  She’d been right, she wasn’t a tactical genius and she didn’t have the forces needed to take on a battlecruiser.  But there had to be something that they could do. 
Cavalier
wasn’t out of the fight just yet.