Last Measure of Devotion (TCOTU, Book 5) (This Corner of the Universe) (11 page)

Heskan simply nodded
before terminating the transmission.  He was gone, out of her reach.  Vernay
felt queasy.  She looked to her right, seeking reassurance.  Chief Brown winked
at her.

*  *  *

“He’s
actually going to test us,” Ladd uttered with incredulity.  “He can’t possibly
be deluded enough to think he can win.”

Wallace
declined to comment as he gaped at the holographic tactical plot with elation. 
During each of the practice runs, he had weathered the disgrace of being bested
at every turn.  Only his iron-fisted control over the fleet and his impeccable
record as a fleet commander had kept his ship captains from inundating the
command frequency with protests over their questionable orders.  Their
exceedingly poor showing, undoubtedly recorded, broadcasted and commented on by
every media ship within the system, threatened to tarnish his unimpeachable
reputation, but now the deception was over and the payoff looked grand.  After enduring
the past hour’s degradation for the off-chance that Garrett Heskan might actually
be foolish enough to permit a combat pass, Wallace realized his ploy could reap
him a rich reward.  If so, not only would his ruse cement him as one of the
most esteemed fleet commanders in the galaxy but it would also bestow him with his
richly deserved revenge.

“They’re
altering course slightly, Admiral,” his assistant noted.  “Not veering away,
they’re turning toward us.”  The man’s face mixed with astonishment and anticipation. 
“Orders, sir?”

Wallace’s
lips curled into a predatory grin as he sent his battle orders.  “Transmit
this.  Primary target is Dioscuri.”

(
Link
to the order of battle; there is
a return link after the chart to continue reading.)

Heskan’s
concentration threatened to bore holes through
Dioscuri’s
main wall
screen. 
It has to happen soon,
he thought as he willed the tactical
plot to update the Saden fleet movements faster than was possible.  Both fleets
were sailing in standard line ahead formations, concealing their intentions.  At
present course and speed, Heskan’s vanguard would graze the 5
ls
perimeter of the GP laser weapons envelope, well ahead of Wallace’s main. 
Vernay’s main section distantly trailed his own, 62
ls
behind him.  Both
sections were sailing at .14
c,
prepared to adjust to any change in their
enemy’s course.

“Movement!”
Cottineau cried out needlessly.

On
the wall screen, heading lines began to swing rapidly for each Saden ship in
the vanguard. 
Course change or speed change,
Heskan wondered. 
Or
both?
  His eyes tracked the distance between his section and the opposing van. 
We’re seventy-seven light-seconds apart…
they started turning over a
minute ago.
  His eyes flickered to the Saden main and rearguard.  Both
sections seemed to be cruising steadily along. 
Their van and main are
forty-five light-seconds apart.  The van will have completed its maneuver
before I can see if the other sections are following suit.

“Stand
by, Mike,” Heskan muttered nervously while keeping focus on the tactical plot.

The
answer revealed itself twenty-one seconds later.  Each of the eight ships in
the Saden vanguard rotated one hundred eighty degrees and touched off its
engines.  At the scant range of 69
ls,
the steady burst of light from
their drives was easily apparent on
Dioscuri’s
optical side screen
.

“Blueshift
on their main!”
Dioscuri’s
sensor section commander alerted.

Heskan
felt his stomach tighten as he appraised the new information.  The Saden
vanguard was slowing down and the section behind it was increasing its velocity. 
“Give me speed on both sections, Mike,” he ordered.  The advantage was tilting
out of favor at precisely the wrong time for the Seshafians.  Both vanguards
would be within missile range in under a minute.  Any order Heskan sent to
Vernay would take longer than that to reach her.  Heskan felt his hand begin to
slide toward the button that would transmit evasive maneuver orders to the
entire fleet.  It wavered over the console. 
No, we’ve come too far just to
give up and with their van and main bunching up, Stacy should be able to
isolate their rearguard and batter it.
  He diverted his hand toward the
communication controls and ordered, “Commander Vernay, you’re free to
maneuver.”  The simple command completed, he looked to his navigator and
issued, “Come to course three-zero-zero.” 
It might be too late to slow down
but I can at least open the distance a bit by turning away from them.
  A
dozen seconds later, Heskan felt his eyebrows furrow in reaction to the
tactical plot. 
What’s Wallace doing now?

The
ships in Wallace’s main began a second rotation but in an unexpected
direction.  Rather than rotating laterally, each ship turned upward, into the
vertical, while still under thrust.  As the errant section climbed high into the
Z-axis while increasing its speed,
Dioscuri’s
tactical plot slowly exposed
the newly forming danger.

To
Heskan’s left, he heard Cottineau’s command to open fire with
Dioscuri’s
missile batteries.  Their target, the Saden van’s fourth-rate, was undoubtedly
replying in kind.  A half minute passed before Heskan understood the full peril
of the developing situation.  During the earlier practice runs, Wallace
attempted to pin Heskan’s main between his own main and rearguard sections. 
The maneuvers had been quickly spotted, poorly executed and easily countered.  This
time, Wallace had waited until much deeper into the run and his captains were
handling their ships with the greater precision they displayed in Seshafi. 
Worse still, they were now targeting the Seshafian van and Wallace’s use of the
vertical axis had delayed Heskan’s recognition of the attempt.  As the danger
registered, Heskan realized that the overall goal of Wallace’s fleet maneuvers,
while less grand than before, was eminently more accomplishable.

He’s
stacking his van and main on top of each other.  The van is slowing down to
match our speed while his main pushes hard to catch up. 
Heskan evaluated
Dioscuri’s
projection for each fleet’s course over the run.  His section would pass
perilously close to both the enemy’s van and main. 
We’re going to get
smashed unless I act now.

Heskan
opened his mouth to speak but the sensor section commander cut him off.  “Enemy
missiles!  Thirty-four light-seconds out and closing at point four-four-C.”

Dioscuri
shuddered as if reacting to the
news.  “Second set of missiles away, Captain,” Cottineau informed.  The lieutenant
commander’s calm was a distinct contrast to the young sensor officer’s outburst.

Waiting
patiently for the reports, Heskan finally ordered, “Helm, roll us thirty
degrees starboard and bear down ninety degrees.  Give us as much negative Z as possible.”

The
command brought a surprised look from his first officer.  “Captain, that
orientation will mask most of our weapons.”

It
was sadly true.  Wallace had boxed them into an untenable position.  If Heskan
continued with his evasive maneuver,
Dioscuri
would have but a single
heavy laser and two GP laser turrets available for self-defense against the approaching
waves of missiles.  Not maneuvering would pit his undersized vanguard against two,
full Saden sections. 
I tried to get too cute,
Heskan cursed his
overconfidence. 
I thought I could skim laser range, inflict a little damage
while getting off lightly in return.  I should have played pure defense and let
Vernay get in the licks for us.

“We won’t stay like
this, Mike,” Heskan explained.  “We’ll zero out our plane before the first missiles
reach our point defense range… but twenty seconds of escape is better than
nothing and we’re too far along in our run for Wallace to react to it.”  The
look on Cottineau’s face clearly expressed a begrudging acceptance of inevitable
defeat.  Heskan bit down hard. 
Does the whole ship feel like I’ve been
out-maneuvered,
he wondered.
  Probably… and they’d be right.
 
Feeling the urge to justify their tenuous position, Heskan stated, “We all knew
we were going to be the bait.  Let’s ride out the storm as best we can.”

*  *  *

Seshafian
Commander Joseph Tannault pressed forward against the pressure of his shockseat
restraints inside
Falcon’s
bridge.  Their plan was working… sort of.  As
difficult as the evidence was to believe, it was clear that the Saden fleet’s
performance during the trial combat passes had been deliberately poor.  The implications
boggled Tannault’s mind. 
Isn’t giving anything but your utmost during war ungentlemanly? 
Isn’t it a breach in etiquette,
he asked himself while shivering
involuntarily.  It was a bitter pill to swallow.  Although Oliver Wallace was
Saden, he was also a respected icon in Seshafi and anything but the living legend’s
strict adherence to corporate honor and tradition threatened to throw their
entire way of war into question.  Tannault watched in near disbelief as
Wallace’s main thundered away from his section, removing the Saden formation as
any threat to his own brig. 
Is this what the outlanders have forced true
heroes to resort to?  Cheap talk of honor followed by cheaper parlor tricks in
battle?

He pushed
the disheartening thoughts from his mind.  For better or worse, Wallace’s
stunts in the trial passes and his maneuvers in the current run were playing
into both parties’ hands.  Wallace’s fleet was going to pummel Seshafi’s tiny
vanguard but, in return, Tannault’s own main would wreak havoc upon the
isolated and poorly positioned Saden rearguard.  Captain Heskan seemed to be at
peace with the impending carnage.  His last order freed the main to maneuver as
Commander Vernay best saw fit to ravage the trailing Saden section.  As it was
now, they were nearly perfectly positioned, slicing in with a slight speed
advantage and an envious angle against the neglected Saden ships, floundering
to starboard. 
We’re going to slash into them and cut them up,
he
thought darkly.  All Commander Vernay needed to do was maintain course and make
the subtle adjustments necessary to obtain raking fire against the first two
ships of the Saden rear.

An
apprehensive voice crackled over the main’s comm channel.  “All ships in the
section will increase speed to point two-two-C, maximum thrust.”

Tannault
jerked back, reacting to the outlandish order as if physically struck.  After a
moment of disbelief, he demanded, “Play that again, Tricia.”

Commander
Vernay’s voice repeated itself in identical, strained fashion.  “All ships in
the section will increase speed to point two-two-C, maximum thrust.”

Tannault
quickly projected the results of the orders on his chair arm console.  To his
left, he heard his first officer whisper incredulity.

He
wanted to join the crude expression of revulsion.  Vernay was ordering each
ship in the section to race ahead, silent on the differences in acceleration
capabilities among her charges.  The projected maneuver played rapidly over his
console screen, revealing that the section would race well ahead, and out of
weapons range, of the Saden rearguard only to clip the edge of the enemy main. 
We’ll only get a couple shots at them, even if she orders us up into the Z
axis.  I’m obviously missing something…

“Follow
the orders,” he spat with skeptical disgust.  “Maximum thrust to point
two-two-C.”  Already, half of the ships in the main were accelerating while the
other half wallowed in confusion.  Ahead of
Falcon
, Vernay’s
Ajax
was already blazing forward, apathetic to the chaos in her wake.  The ships in
the section stretched grotesquely apart as seconds ticked by. 
This is
disgraceful
.  Tannault’s hand hovered over his communications console but wavered. 
He mustered every ounce of professionalism to resist the urge to use the
controls.

The discipline
instilled in him over a fourteen-year career won out.  Lieutenant Clayton
Covington’s did not.  Tannault listened, enraptured by the exchange over the
command channel.

“Commander
Vernay… Ma’am, what are we doing?”

“Get
your brig moving, mister!” came the urgent reply.  “All ships in the main,
rotate up twenty degrees for positive Z, continue acceleration.”

Covington
was mystified.  “Captain, we’re missing our target.  We’ll pass well ahead of
them now.”

“Our
targets are the ships in the Saden main.  We’ll get some shots at those snows, Cassette
and Cartridge, and we might just draw that section’s fire away from our van.
 
Move your damned ship, Clayton!”

Tannault
studied the tactical plot.  What Vernay suggested was possible, depending upon
how much speed the ships in their section could pile on.  He felt himself frown
as he brought up the specifications of the new targets, two Munition-class snows. 
His frown deepened as he weighed Vernay’s actions.  She had traded potentially
crippling salvoes against a Saden third-rate and brig for grazing fire against
two insignificant ships.

“Aye,
aye, ma’am.  Covington out.”

Hawk’s
vector line expanded rapidly as Covington’s
brig came under belated full power.  Already, Tannault noted, the three ships
from the Iron Brigade were passing that brig as the formation’s integrity continued
to disintegrate.  The orderly section had distorted into a mob.  Tannault felt heat
in his cheeks as the spectacle of his section brought both embarrassment and
fury.

*  *  *

Three
Javelin-IX missiles perished inside of 3
ls
from
Dioscuri
.  The
withering fire from her five GP laser turrets had swept the first enemy salvo cleanly
from space.  Heskan noticed that Lieutenant Gentry allocated the two,
forward-most dual GP laser turrets toward one of the missiles, the two aft-most
turrets to a second and left Gunnersmate Third Class Lee Thomas to handle the
third missile single-handedly.  Gentry’s target distribution had proven wise
and now
Dioscuri
would have a twenty-four second reprieve as she waited
for the second volley from Sade’s
Courageux
to enter the 5
ls
point defense envelope. 
Dioscuri
and her sister-ships were still over 33
ls
from the Saden vanguard but closing at a combined .28
c
.

Gentry’s
voice was thick with nervous anticipation.  “One hundred seconds until heavy
laser range, Captain.”  She double-checked her console and stated, “The
Maclexes should be unmasked before we enter their range.”

Heskan
nodded but kept his focus committed to the tactical plot.  Although the enemy
van would pass well within directed-energy weapons range, his gamble to dive
his ships away from the oncoming sections seemed destined to give the Saden
main nothing more than missile and distant heavy laser shots.  Wallace would
not have time to react and counter-maneuver.  All three Saden sections were now
locked on their present course in order to give individual ships time to orient
their best broadside to the enemy.  The three different classes of snows in
Heskan’s vanguard were similarly thrusting into unique headings to profile
toward the enemy based upon their individual armaments.