Guardians of the Galactic Sentinel 1: The Deimos Artifact (10 page)

"Aye, Cap'n, power up the weapons and secure everything that isn't already locked down. We expectin' trouble from that ship, Cap'n?"

"I'm not sure yet, but we'd better be ready."

Behind them, still steadily accelerating, the unknown ship approached the jump zone that the
Capri
had just transitioned through.

Chapter 10.
Star-tortoise vs Star-hare.

Deep Space, Star System 10711, July 6, 2676.

Zack headed down through the ship to the boardroom and entered the turret, closing and dogging the outside hatch before climbing the short ladder upwards and repeating the process on the hatch in the floor of the projector chamber. He slid into the gunner's chair and fastened the restraints. His gunnery instincts kicked in and he smoothly made a series of adjustments to the chair and the various hand controls to ensure that everything was placed exactly where he wanted it to be. Finally, he slipped his feet into the attitude control stirrups. Satisfied, he called down to engineering.

"Engineering? This is weapons. Do I have power?"

"Engineering here. Powering up weapons...now."

After about ten seconds, a green light appeared on the lower right hand side of the console in front of Zack. He immediately ran a diagnostic to ensure that everything would work properly when and if they needed to use the weapon.

"Thanks, Cliff," said Zack.

"Just be hittin' what you're aimin' at!"

"I'll do my best."

With only three people onboard the small ship, Captain Ariane decided to simplify their communications.

"Guys?"

"Weapons here."

"Engineering here."

"How about we each keep our intercom switches on? There are only three of us and communications could turn out to be vital over the next several hours."

"Roger, that," replied Zack.

"Good idea," said Cliff.

"Two questions, Captain," said Zack.

"Go ahead, Weapons."

"How long to sublight again?"

There was a short pause while Ariane checked her instruments. "We won't be far enough away from the hyperlink zone for another hour and five minutes, give or take two minutes."

"And the enemy ship?"

"We should hit sublight before he gets within range."

"And then what?"

"Then we ride the sublight currents for about eight hours and hope he doesn’t come out too close behind us. How are you doing with that weapon?"

The diagnostic program had finished running, showing nothing but green lights.

"Everything looks good up here," said Zack, "I'm ready to charge the capacitors and deploy the weapon. Should I give it a try?"

"Negative, Zack, our tail just came out of hyper a couple of minutes ago. Surprise is about the only thing we have going for us. Secure the weapon and get back down here to the bridge. I might need your help."

Zack put the weapon system on standby before returning to the bridge to find a very busy pilot. He resumed his station and kept a careful eye on his own readouts as Ariane made a series of adjustments on the pilot's console, presumably to enable the jump to sublight earlier than normal. The time went by surprisingly fast. Zack watched his monitor as the enemy continued to draw ever closer. The blip on his screen had made up an alarming amount of the distance between the two ships when Ariane called down to engineering.

"Engineering?"

"Yes, Ma'am?"

"Prepare for sublight in two minutes."

"Aye, aye, Cap'n, sublight in two minutes. We'll be ready!"

The pilot's eyes flitted repeatedly back and forth and up and down across her instrument panel, scanning all the pertinent readings before she finally announced, "Everybody strap down; sublight in ten seconds!"

Zack waited and watched in tense fascination as she ran through and completed a ten-second countdown.

"...three...two...one...engage sublight drive!"

This time the transition was anything but smooth. The
Capri
immediately began wallowing, bucking and floundering like an ancient rowboat on a raging, tempest-ravaged sea. During any given instant, the tiny ship was in imminent danger of being swept away and torn apart by the hyper-violent, unpredictable currents and sheer forces that prevailed in the sublight region they had chosen to enter.

Ariane was frantically busy at the controls for the next hour and a half, skillfully and, at times desperately, using thrusters and even occasional bursts of the reaction engines to keep the little ship aligned with the seething cataract of sublight currents roiling in the fabric of space at a distance far too close to the hyperzone nexus for safety or sanity. Zack could do nothing but hold on and watch as Ariane, beads of perspiration on her forehead, wrestled with the controls of the randomly heaving and jerking ship. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the ride smoothed out and, outside of dealing with an occasional bump, their obviously exhausted pilot could relax a little at the controls.

"We'll be in the normal sublight zone in two minutes," she announced.

Right on time, the ride smoothed out into a glassy smooth glide. Ariane, her forehead glistening and her body shaking from her efforts, finally activated the autopilot and stood down from what had to have been a harrowing and exhausting ordeal. She turned towards Zack, wiped at her forehead with the back of her sleeve, and said shakily, "Remind me to never, ever try anything that stupid again!"

"Was it worth the effort?"

"We won't know until both ships are out of sublight again," she replied, "Even if they figure out what we did and copy the maneuver, we will have gained a little time. We can only hope it'll be enough."

"Are you alright?"

"I think so...but I feel like I just went through an asteroid crusher."

Zack held out a hand and helped her get up from her station.

"I'm okay," she said, refusing any more assistance, even though she was visibly shaking, "I just need to get to my cabin and get some rest." She took a deep breath and let it out slowly, "We'll be okay while we remain in sublight. I've set the controls to bring us out at the normal distance from the jump zone. You can only risk the rough currents while leaving a hyperjump zone; you don't dare try it going into one. Guaranteed suicide." She turned a tired face towards Zack, "Just watch the console like you did before. I'll probably crash and burn for several hours."

"Will do," said Zack. He watched with genuine concern as she negotiated the short distance to the aft hatch with her neck bowed, using her left arm and hand to brace herself against the wall. She slipped wearily through the hatch and down the short ladder after which he lost sight of her.

Zack had a million questions for her but knew they would have to wait. The safety of the ship was paramount and the crew desperately needed their pilot to be in top form, no matter who she turned out to be.

He busied himself for about an hour checking around the ship to see if anything had been knocked loose by the intense buffeting but found things to be pretty much in order. After checking in with engineering and discovering that Cliff was also getting some much-deserved rest, Zack went back up to the bridge and took a seat at the pilot's station as he had been instructed to do. He allowed his mind to rove over the torrent of chaotic events that had brought him to this moment and, before he knew it, was awakened by the alarm that Ariane had set.

He shook himself awake, went the short distance down to the Captain's chamber and softly rapped on the door.

"Ariane? The alarm just went off."

"It's okay, I woke up about a half hour ago. I'll be right out."

The pilot came out looking considerably better than she had going in, but it was still obvious that she had been through a wringer and hadn't completely recovered. She resumed her station and began to scan readouts, bringing herself up to date on the ship's status. In an effort to make use of the limited time they had, Zack went back to the galley and made up another batch of sandwiches, leaving one down in engineering with Cliff and bringing the other two back to the bridge.

"Thank you...Cook," she said, a weak attempt at a jest that Zack took as a welcome measure of how much better she felt.

"My pleasure, Madam," he replied.

Ariane remained preoccupied with her instruments as Zack cleaned up after the meal and returned to the bridge to prepare himself for what was coming next.

"Phasing out of sublight transition in three...two...one...execute!" said Ariane.

The Capri phased easily back into normal space.

"Engineering? Give me full emergency reaction thrust again."

"Aye, Cap'n, full emergency thrust."

Again Zack could feel the urgent push into his chair. "What now?" he asked.

"Now we wait to see how quickly he comes out of sublight. After which we see what kind of velocity he's built up. If he's an hour or more behind us, we might just have a chance."

Forty-five minutes later Zack detected the telltale blooming flash on his instruments indicating a ship translating back into normal space.

"Damn!" said Ariane, "You'd better get back up and man that weapon, Zack. Looks like we could be in for a fight!"

Zack headed back down to the turret and prepared it for action. Five minutes later he announced, "Turret ready for deployment."

"Okay," Ariane replied immediately.

"Got an update for me?" he asked.

This time the pause before he got a reply stretched out a bit longer. Seemed it was Ariane's turn to ask a question, "What's the effective range of our pulse projectors again?"

"I can't be absolutely sure but we should be able to rattle them pretty good after they get within two thousand kilometers or so."

Another short silence was followed by, "Not good. The enemy will be within the effective range of our weapons at least fifteen minutes before we can go hyper."

"Okay," said Zack, "why is that not good?"

This time the silence was considerably shorter.

"Assuming my guess is correct and that his ship has similar weapons capabilities, that puts us into range of his weapons during the same time frame."

"What are you basing your guess on?"

"It looks like a standard Soviet military courier/scout ship. If I'm right, I expect that his beam weapons have a range pretty similar to ours. Their guns are obviously quite a bit newer, but they aren't all that much more powerful."

"Are you sure that ship isn't armed with Matsukov projectors?" asked Zack, remembering his earlier encounter with Soviet weaponry back on New Slovenia, "Those would be way more powerful than ours."

"More powerful, yes, but they also draw an awful lot of power. I've never heard of anyone putting Matsukov's on a ship of that size."

Having seen several of the powerful weapons in the hands of relatively unsophisticated rebel forces, Zack had his doubts but decided not to press the issue, "Call it pretty much a draw then. What about missiles?"

Again there was a longish pause. "He could be carrying up to four missiles, but I don't think he'd use them except as a last resort. How good a shot are you, Zack? Think you could hit a missile?"

"Tough target," replied Zack, "I'd rather not have to even try; but, if it was coming straight at us and I had some time to get ready, I could probably hit it. Chances are you wouldn't like how close it would get before I did, though," added the gunner.

"I really don't think we need to worry that he'll use his missiles," said Ariane, "The results would be way too unpredictable. I expect their tactic will be to use their pulse beam weapons to fire a series of warning shots in hopes of scaring us into letting them catch us. If that doesn't work, they'll probably try rattling us with an actual hit or two. They can't afford to be too aggressive because they can't take the risk of severely damaging this ship and possibly destroying the artifact."

"The artifact that may or may not be onboard the ship?"

"Yeah, that one."

"If we get through this," said Zack, "I'll have to have another look at my uncle's notes. He must have left some kind of clue as to where it might be."

"We'll get through this," replied Ariane, "Don't fire that weapon until he gets in really close, say a thousand kilometers or so. If they have their shields set at minimum power -- which I expect they will since they probably don't know we're armed -- and they're using full emergency acceleration, the sudden power draw on their shields could cause them some real problems. We might even get lucky and be able to do some serious damage."

"Here's hoping," said Zack. "Where is he now?"

"In spite of our power upgrades, he's got more thrust than we do. We'll be within range of his weapons sometime within the next hour and ten minutes. I suggest you make absolutely sure that weapon is ready."

"Aye, Aye, Captain!"

Chapter
11.
Under Fire.

Deep Space, Star System 10711, July 6, 2676.

Soviet Courier Ship
Murmansk.

As the
Capri
had done in her desperate attempt to escape, the Soviet ship had phased into sublight drive at the very same ill-advised distance from the hyperlink zone. The courier had experienced a similarly rough ride but, because the Soviet ship was considerably larger, she hadn't been tossed around nearly as violently as the yacht had been. The
Murmansk
also had the luxury of having two skilled pilots on board who could spell each other. The pursuing ship phased out of sublight satisfyingly close to their quarry.

Captain Sergei Popov was on the bridge of the
Murmansk
, looking over the shoulder of the pilot on duty. Behind him, Political Officer Dmitri Krupski slipped onto the bridge and took his customary station, a console on the starboard side, way over against the aft bulkhead where he could readily keep an eye on everything and everyone. Sergei did his best to ignore the unwelcome intrusion.

"Engineering?" said the Captain.

"Engineering here."

"Maintain full emergency acceleration until further notice, Alex."

"Aye, Aye, Captain."

"Sensors? How long until the bogey is within weapons range," asked Sergei.

"It will only be another hour and two minutes, Sir," came the reply.

"Weapons?"

"Aye, Captain. Weapons are ready."

"You must take the utmost care to avoid causing any serious damage to that ship," said Krupski, addressing the Captain and speaking loudly enough so that everyone on the bridge could hear, leaving no doubt as to who was really in charge, "Do you understand?"

"We understand, Major," said Sergei, clamping down on a surge of anger, "Per your instructions, we are to aim to disable only."

Krupski continued, "Aim your first two pulses to go under that ship. If he does not heave to, see if you can target the reaction engines on the rear of the ship."

"As you say, Major, two pulses underneath the ship and if he does not stop running we are to target his reaction engines. Under no circumstances are we to make any attempt to severely damage the enemy ship."

"Very good, Captain. See that you keep that in mind."

Sergei seethed inwardly at the Political Officer's haughty and disrespectful manner and silently watched the plot on the pilot's console for the next several minutes. He smiled grimly. Soon they would overtake their target.

***

Capri.

Inside the
Capri's
retractable turret, Zack turned his attention back to the weapons control console. Though the weapon he had been trained on had not been a retractable type, everything on the control console was instantly familiar. A few switches were in slightly different positions on this older unit, but everything was clearly marked, even though some of the labels on the most frequently used controls were a bit worn and faded. Over on the left-hand side of the console were the most unfamiliar of the controls, those that regulated the retraction/deployment of the projector portion of the emplacement.

Zack flipped the big master toggle that powered up all of the turret's systems. The already dim lights in the turret dimmed noticeably before returning to their previous level. Seeing that the master power indicator continued to glow green, he flipped a series of switches to initiate the charge cycle on the six capacitors that powered the plasma projectors. There were three capacitors for each projector, packed tightly into separate banks in the chamber beneath him. Meantime, he activated the deployment mechanism for the turret.

After a muffled "clunk" accompanied by slight lurch upwards, he could hear the deep whine of the lift motors as he felt the cylindrical compartment he was in begin to smoothly rise. After about thirty seconds had passed, the mechanisms that lifted the turret reached their outer limits. He felt another muffled clunk and heard the deep whine cease as the machinery completed the deployment. The turret was now locked in ready position.

While the weapon system was in storage, the projectors had been retracted into two protective alcoves built into the front of the turret. These alcoves, each of which was shaped like a cylinder sliced in half lengthwise from top to bottom, were embedded in the curved outside wall of the turret with one arrayed to either side of the central gunner's position.

Right next to the deployment system controls for the turret, Zack found the complimentary set of controls that extended and locked the projectors into firing position. He activated the system and again was treated to the sound of motors whirring and gears operating as the two projectors simultaneously folded up out of their docking alcoves and locked into firing position. In the meantime, the row of lights indicating the charge state of the six capacitors had all turned green.

The weapon was ready to fire.

Zack worked the foot controls to pivot the projectors from pointing forward, where they had been aimed at deployment, to aft from where the enemy ship was rapidly overtaking them. As he swung the projectors to aim dead aft, he saw the pylon and the number three reaction engine go through the field of view on his video monitor.

The
Capri
was equipped with three reaction engines, each of which was mounted on its own pylon. The engines were arranged in a "Y" configuration with each engine mounted a perfectly symmetrical one hundred and twenty degrees away from the other two. The engine designated as "number one" was mounted straight down from the bottom of the ship and numbers two and three were mounted to port and starboard respectively. This arrangement allowed Zack to fire the weapon directly aft by aiming the projectors between the two side-mounted reaction engines. If the ship had been equipped with the more conventional "+" or "cross" arrangement of a four-reaction engine configuration, he would not have been able to align the shot as easily.

Zack made a mental note for future reference to program the guns so they wouldn't fire if they were aligned in such a way that either of the projector pulses would hit one or the other of the engines or their pylons. Given the present situation, there simply wasn't time to get that done.

He found the enemy blip on the targeting display and touched the screen to activate the automatic tracking systems. He decided immediately that, as tempting as it was, he would not be using the automatic targeting system when the time came to actually fire the weapons. He had no idea when or even if the system had been calibrated since the weapon had been installed on the ship. He was going to have to aim and fire the projectors manually.

Even if he changed his mind in the meantime, with the automatic system activated, the turret would track his target and keep the projectors aimed in the general direction of where Zack wanted them. From the weapons system itself, he could also now get very precise information on distance to target. He then spent some time reconfirming the status of the weapon by performing a systems check. When he was finished, he was surprised to see how much time had passed.

"Weapons ready, Captain," he announced, "Range...three thousand kilometers and closing. ETA into our weapons zone...approximately fifteen minutes."

"I copy, Weapons," replied Ariane, "I expect they'll be hailing us soon."

***

Murmansk.

"Bogey is coming into extreme weapons range, Captain."

"Thank you, Sensors."

"Communications?"

"Aye, Captain?"

"Open a channel to that ship."

"Aye, Aye, Captain." Having anticipated the request, the communications officer had been ready to respond for the last ten minutes, "Channel open, Sir."

Sergei employed a stern, no-nonsense command voice, "
Capri
? You are to cease acceleration and stand down in preparation for boarding. Comply within two minutes or we open fire."

There was a pause of nearly half a minute before the communications tech got a response. A woman's voice replied,
"Who are you and by what authority do you make these demands?"

"Who we are is not important," replied Sergei, "My authority comes from this beam weapon." He cut off the broadcast connection to the civilian ship and hit the intercom button for his weapons officer. "Weapons? Fire a pulse under the belly of that ship!"

"Aye, aye, Captain.

Sergei heard a muffled "thwap" as the pulse beam weapon system converted the massive capacitor charge into a plasma pulse. The single, powerful pulse strobed out from the
Murmansk
, seeking the
Capri
.

***

Capri.

"The enemy ship just fired a weapon," said Zack. He had been continuously monitoring the pursuing ship from the targeting console and easily had the best vantage point of any of
Capri's
crew to do so. He watched as a well-aimed pulse flashed by a good ten kilometers beneath the yacht. He felt a chill run through him as he recognized the characteristic blue signature of a Matsukov projector. Ariane had been wrong; the enemy had somehow managed to arm the courier with one of the highly advanced weapons. The level of danger faced by the crew of the
Capri
had just ratcheted up by several magnitudes.

"A warning shot just crossed underneath," said Zack, "It looked like a pulse from a Matsukov projector, just as I feared."

"I saw," said Ariane, "Pretty hard to ignore. Not much we could have done about it in any case. We have no choice but to stick with our original plan."

"Agreed," replied Zack. He checked his instruments again, "They're well within range. When do you want me to return fire?"

"Let him get a little closer. I'm pretty sure he'll give us one more hail and fire one more warning shot before he tries anything serious. I'm counting on the fact that they really can't risk damaging the artifact. With that Matsukov, they're going to have to be even more careful."

"I hope you're right," said Zack.

"So do I," replied Ariane, "Cliff? Keep those shields at full power!"

"Aye, Aye, Cap'n. It's my skin too, you know!"

Ariane's communications console lit up. She set the incoming message so the two men could hear over the intercom.

"
Capri
? This is your final warning. Stand down and prepare to be boarded or we will open fire."

Zack watched as another pulse flashed underneath their ship. He couldn't be absolutely sure, but this one looked as though it might have been a tad closer than the last one.

"Hyperjump in seven minutes," said Ariane, "What's the range to that ship, Zack?"

"Twelve hundred kilometers and closing, Captain."

"Their next shot will almost certainly be targeting one of our reaction engines," said Ariane, "I don't think we should risk taking a hit unless we absolutely have to. Fire when ready."

"Aye, aye, Captain," said Zack.

"Just don't miss," added Ariane.

Zack decided to stick with his original instincts and manually aim and fire the somewhat unfamiliar weapon. He knew that even at the relatively short distance between the two ships, if his aim was off by more than the merest micro-fraction of a degree, he would miss. It looked as though their only chance of avoiding what would likely be a one-sided battle with the enemy ship and making good on their escape depended on him hitting his target.

In an effort to increase the odds, he decided his best chance of scoring some hits was to fire a full spread of three pulses from each projector. The weapon would require a short time for the six capacitors to recharge before it would be able to fire again. He figured he would see whether or not he needed to fire another spread after he saw what the results of the initial volley were.

The
Murmansk
had gained another two hundred kilometers on the
Capri
by the time Zack pressed the firing stud. He aimed the weapons just the merest fraction of a degree to port of the enemy ship before he triggered the pulses. Holding down the firing stud to ensure continuous fire, Zack then used the turret's fine adjustment controls to sweep the projectors across the target area, with the last of the six pulses aimed just the merest fraction of a degree to starboard of the enemy. He could feel the almost imperceptible movement of the turret as he walked the spread across the target zone. Zack heard and felt three muffled, evenly spaced, successive "thwaps" from the projectors in front of him followed by two sharp "pops" and a final "thwap."

Something had gone wrong! Only four pulses strobed out towards the enemy ship when there should have been six! Zack immediately felt the hum of the capacitors recharging below him.

He was wrenched violently to starboard and downward against the restraints as Ariane initiated a series of evasive maneuvers.