No Way to Start a War (TCOTU, Book 2) (This Corner of the Universe) (21 page)

*  *  *

On
Aspis
,
Captain Gary unknowingly echoed Heskan’s thoughts. 
So I just sit here and
nap while everyone else does their job?
  She looked back to her bridge’s
wall screen, focused on
Bulwark
.  The light cruiser’s starboard hull was
nearly obscured by the debris field it was producing. 
Those poor sailors on
Bulwark, talk about being dealt a losing hand
.

“Captain,
our fighters will make their second pass soon,” her sensor officer said.

“At
who, Mike?” Gary asked.

“Looks
like they are all concentrating on Destroyer-One,” the lieutenant answered.

Gary quickly looked
to her weapons officer and snapped, “WEPS, shift your fire to that destroyer. 
We’ve got to give those Hollie gunners something to think about besides our
fighters!” 
The fighter losses have been atrocious.  Those pilots might be
brave but bravery can’t stop a GP burst.
  Her system status display console
flashed angrily at her as the first enemy barrages began to look past
Bulwark
and lance through the rest of the Brevic formation.

*  *  *

The
charged energy bursts from the Hollaran Issic turrets streaked across space at
the speed of light.  The first shots against the bulk of the Brevic formation
had come two seconds after the opening Brevic RSL barrage, given the Issic twin
salvos at
Bulwark
and the extended recycle time of the heavy lasers. 
The bursts had covered 4
ls
of the 9
ls
between the combatants when
the Issics barked again.  The initial Issic shots at the fleet were one second
from their targets when a third salvo passed through the Hollaran lenses.

The
shots aimed at
Kite
slammed into the shield walls of her starboard
side.  The shields demanded increasing amounts of power to maintain their
integrity until the sensors monitoring the Gibson generators registered
imminent critical overloads and cut power to the system.  As shield walls began
to drop, gaps in
Kite’s
deflection barriers appeared and laser fire leaked
in.

The
first blow to
Kite
in the Helike system came thirty meters forward of
her LAZ-B manager’s quad AMS-34 turret.  Held tightly in his shockseat, Gunner’s
Mate Second Class Tyler Pruette heard decompression alarms sound through the
secured door between his laser turret and its access hallway.  Pruette glanced
away from his weapon’s screen, upward and toward an overhead console displaying
the status of the eighteen AMS turrets that he supervised.

All
but one turret glowed a reassuring green.  The standout was blinking yellow,
indicating a loss of connection between Pruette’s management station and the AMS-32
position.  He flicked his comm button and asked, “Harper, how ya doing in
there?”

As he
waited for a response, he refocused on his weapon’s display to ensure his own quad
AMS laser had retained its lock on the nearest Hollaran ship.  The light
cruiser was well beyond his 5
ls
range and would likely remain that way,
but the task gave him something to do other than drum his fingers on the
console while the Hollarans took pot shots at him.  “Harper, report,” he
ordered with increasing urgency.

To
date, Pruette had been lucky.  The seventeen spacemen under his supervision in the
starboard AMS turrets numbered Seventeen through Thirty-three had suffered no casualties
despite the captain’s penchant for facing
Kite’s
starboard side toward
the enemy.  At Sponde, Pruette had feared for Able Gunner Sim’s life when a Greyhound
missile had detonated near the AMS-30 mount, but she had miraculously answered
his comm query eventually to announce her survival. 
My luck had to run out sooner
or later
, Pruette thought bleakly.

Mickey
Harper was from Isonoe, the same star system that Able Spaceman Thomas called
home.  The two had become fast friends.  Thomas, barely recovered from his
wounds at Skathi, had received medical clearance just in time to make it aboard
Kite
.  Pruette had placed Thomas in the turret next to Harper’s Thirty-two
at both spacemen’s requests.  He regretted that decision now as he realized
that if Thomas were killed along with Harper, he’d be haunted by the fact that
he had consciously put Thomas in that chair. 
Who am I kidding
, Pruette
thought,
if Lee Thomas dies, it’ll haunt me no matter what
.

Giving up hope,
Pruette pressed his alternate comm frequency controls to report the probable
loss of AMS-32 to Damage Controlman Second Class Hartenstein, the OPS petty
officer responsible for his LAZ-B subsection.  Midway through the conversation,
the next Hollaran laser bursts struck
Kite
.

*  *  *

Heskan’s
system status display began to light up rapidly.  Starboard compartments along
Kite’s
perimeter pulsed red, denoting damage as shields collapsed under the assault of
heavy laser fire.  The display gave Heskan a semi-accurate picture of where his
ship was hit but little indication of the severity of the damage.  More
compartments, this time deeper inside
Kite
, began flashing next.

“Decompression
alarms all over the ship,” Brown reported.  “Looks like containment fields are
sealin’ up most of ‘em but we’re losin’ atmo bad amidship.”  In contrast to the
bedlam occurring along
Kite’s
starboard beam, only the serene, rhythmic sounds
of the bridge remained after Brown’s report.  Off to Heskan’s right, Spencer
continued issuing muted direction to his section.

Heskan
judged the heavy lasers had penetrated nearly halfway into
Kite
based on
his systems status display.  It appeared that some of his starboard RSL
batteries had gone silent and several shield generators were nonfunctional but
Kite’s
critical power plants had been spared.  A brilliant flash on the optical drew
Heskan’s attention.  A moment later, he watched
Bulwark
explode.

“ELTI
Bulwark.  ELTI Arrow,” Truesworth announced in rapid-fire succession.

In
recompense, the Hollaran light cruiser that CortRon 15 focused on succumbed to the
fusillade of RSL fire.  The Hollaran ship split nearly amidship and although
her forward half tumbled gently away largely intact, her stern was being
consumed in a series of secondary explosions.

After
another crescendo of fire,
Kite
broke free of the 10
ls
sphere of destruction. 
Breathing a silent sigh of relief for his ship’s survival, Heskan quickly
looked at the remains of Task Group 3.1. 
Eagle
was still sailing
although riddled with holes along the length of her hull.  Her superstructure,
which partially enclosed the aft third of her top recovery deck, had been
lanced multiple times and it was clear the environment inside had vented. 
Eagle
had rolled slightly to port to protect her recovery deck at the expense of her
lower hull, which bore numerous ruptures.  She had suffered additional hits to
her starboard wing but the drives housed in the wing were already dead from
earlier missile strikes. 
Eagle
had also rotated along with CortRon 15
to protect her remaining drives, which had exited the battle unscathed.

Aspis
was easy to find,
proudly holding her corner of the square.  At first glance, Heskan thought
Kite’s
sister had escaped undamaged but a closer examination revealed containment
fields active near her bow. 
Tomahawk
had likewise weathered the raking
of her bow, but
Curator
was burning from three large rents in her
starboard hull closer to her stern.  The short lines of flame extending from
her hull appeared to be burning themselves out, but the trail of wreckage spoke
of heavy damage inside the destroyer.  Little
Bolt
seemed to have been
beneath Hollaran notice.  In stark contrast, while
Bolt
had sailed untouched
in the formation’s center, her companion,
Arrow,
was gone.

“Could’ve
been worse, Capt’n,” Brown said.

“I
guess, but a third of the squadron lost and most of us damaged…”  Heskan
examined the optical of the Hollaran fleet. 
That Hollie light cruiser never
had a chance.  Neither of those destroyers had damage before the engagement and
one of them now looks like it’s been put out of action.  Two ships for two
ships.  I’m surprised we made out as well as we did considering we were
outgunned two to one.  I guess Tomahawk and our fighters helped even that out.

“How
bad a beating did the fighters take, Jack?” Heskan asked.

After
a brief delay, the sensorman answered, “I can only see three fighters, Captain.” 
He shook his head in disbelief.  “That can’t be right, there has to be more.”

They
lost forty-four out of forty-seven fighters
?  Heskan stared thunderstruck at the tactical plot,
searching for more fighter symbols in vain as he heard Vernay’s demanding voice
beside him.

“Chief,
I want Kite’s damage report ASAP.”

“It’s
coming, L-T,” the chief politely replied as he glanced over toward Heskan.

Heskan
returned Brown’s look and he tried to suppress a wry smile. 
I remember back
on Anelace ordering the same thing, wanting to know exactly how bad we’d been
hurt sooner than humanly possible.  I practically insisted on damage reports to
immediately appear before my very eyes. 
Once sure he had his first
officer’s attention, Heskan gestured subtly to Vernay in a “slow down” motion
but softened it with a friendly wink
.
  Afterwards, he looked back at the
optical of his squadron. 
Curator
no longer trailed fire.
  I guess
it’s time to insist on unreasonably fast damage reports myself…

Heskan
took two deep breaths meant to calm himself after the adrenalin dump of
combat.  After a long and slow exhale, he activated the squadron channel and said,
“CortRon Fifteen, I need to know the functionality of your tunnel drives
soonest.  I also want a preliminary damage estimate when available.  Heskan
out.”

“The
Hollies are turning toward us, Captain,” Truesworth alerted.  On the tactical screen,
the vector lines of Lombardi’s fleet, excluding a mangled destroyer, were shrinking
as the ships began to reduce their momentum away from the tunnel point. 
“They’ll brake to zero and then achieve point two light toward us in one
hundred thirty seconds.”

“How
far will that put them behind us once they’re up to speed?” Heskan asked.

Truesworth
quickly computed time and distance.  “Almost exactly one light-minute, about
five minutes travel time behind us at point two-C.”

Kite’s
navigator understood the
implications immediately.  “Depending if Eagle can accelerate back to point two
when we dive into Kale, we
should
be able to keep them from closing to
heavy laser range again.”

“Lieutenant,”
Brown said, “I have that damage report for you.”

Vernay
shot a concerned look at the chief.  “How bad are the casualties?”

She
chewed her lower lip as Brown replied, “Forty-seven killed, fifteen wounded.”

Heskan’s
heart sank upon hearing the news. 
Forty-seven!
 
The attack didn’t
seem that bad from the bridge.
 
It’s just so unfair
, he thought. 
Here
I sat, comfortable in a heavily protected compartment while my crewmembers died
in droves at their exposed posts.  The bridge was so calm that it didn’t even
feel like a battle… it’s so easy to forget that each pulse on my system status
display means violent death for the people I’m responsible for
.  Heskan
looked down at his posture.  After the shockseat’s restraints were lifted, he
had been leaning back in his captain’s chair, his legs crossed casually.  He
grunted in disgust and sat up straight.

Vernay
continued speaking, oblivious to Heskan’s internal reprimands.  “And the ship?”

Brown
looked at his monitor as he rattled off the damage.  “As far as combat systems,
RSL-Six an’ -Eight are down.  AMS turrets Seven, Eight, Ten, Fifteen, Sixteen,
Twenty, Twenty-three, Twenty-five and Thirty-two are all down.  Shield generators
Four an’ Six aren’t regeneratin’ an’ were taken offline.  We’re at fifty
percent strength on our starboard shields for now.”

Brown
pecked loudly on his console to transfer
Kite’s
status to the main wall
screen.  “Some of those Issics punched pretty far into Kite.  Auxiliary Control
got hit by the same shots that took out AMS Twenty.  Those bursts must’ve had
eyes to hit the compartment.”  He looked toward Heskan.  “I think Lieutenant
Spring was one of the KIAs in there.”  Brown returned his attention to Vernay
and continued, “The damage list to non-combat compartments an’ equipment is nine
pages long an’ growin’, ma’am.”

“Thank
you, Chief,” Vernay replied as she began to call down to
Kite’s
medical
section.

Heskan
nodded toward Brown.  “Chief, if Lieutenant Spring is out of action, you have
command of Operations for now.”  Heskan saw the chief nod once as he refocused
attention back to the squadron.  Task Group 3.1 was 7
lm
from the Kale
tunnel point and would reach it in an estimated thirty-five minutes.  The three
survivors of the fighter wing’s strafing runs were taking a wide berth around
the Hollaran fleet as they attempted to catch up to
Eagle
.  Heskan drew
vector lines from the fighters to the carrier on his tactical display and
Kite
calculated the fighters would need fourteen minutes to reach
Eagle
.  
That’s
if she’s able to receive craft
, he thought
.  If so, they’ll have about
fifteen minutes to land safely before Eagle dives.