Opening Moves (50 page)

“
Entering weapon's range,” weapons officer Batal, a Komerco hired for the job, reported. “Fighters moving our way.”

“
Detach our escorts, send the fighters to intercept and stay on the primary target,” Natara commanded, focusing solely on her mission to remove the enemy ships and not be distracted by the Ashani counter moves. “All forward batteries, open fire!”

Her own fighters outnumbered the Ashani Swiftpaws, and even the skill of their trained pilots wasn't going to earn victory against so many Érenni. Even so, they attacked without reservation, driving headlong into the Republican formation, swinging around to entangle them in a frantic dogfight, forcing the cruisers to carefully select their fire as to not shoot down their own birds. Their vicious tactics caught the Érenni by surprise. A dozen green blips representing Republican fighters vanished from Natara's tactical holoplot, but her own forces' numerical superiority just as quickly began to weigh in, and within a minute the Dominion had lost most of its fighters. Still, like religious fanatics, the few survivors tried to do as much damage as possible before her own fighters and laser clusters reduced them to debris and expanding clouds of vapor.

“Picking up extensive high frequency transmissions, captain,” Torok Sen reported. “Emissions match profiles for long-range tachyon communications.” She shot her captain a worried glance.

Natara's face darkened. As much as superluminal communication was part of their civilization only the largest ships usually were able to hold the facilities for an interstellar tachyon emitter, let alone the means to generate the necessary power. If they had managed to cram the necessary facilities into a cruiser's hull without limiting the ship's other capabilities...

“Comm, make sure all data we pick up is relayed to central command,” she quickly commanded. “Can we jam them?”

The communications officer shrugged. “We can try.” She didn't wait for an order and went straight to work.

Natara concentrated on the enemy ships ahead of her. “Time to firing range?”

“
Twenty seconds at current speed. Targeting systems ready, weapons armed,” Batal stated. They could have fired from farther away, but at longer ranges the lasers were less coherent and the time lag between firing and striking the target was greater, making their accuracy questionable. And the Érenni cruisers were light on missiles.

The Ashani were too deep inside the star system's gravity well to escape – and they knew it. The cruiser and its destroyer escorts changed course, superheated plasma erupting from their engines.

“They're charging right into our fire, skipper!” Sen called out.

Missiles leaped from the
Sunchaser
's tubes and greenish laser beams filled the void between the two flotillas as the Ashani ships opened up. They were still too far away to do much damage, but they did score hits. Alarms howled through PERISAI and helmets snapped shut across the bridge.

“
Make sure the assault units all fire at the same target,” Captain Natara reminded them as she counted down from twenty in her head. “No half measures, just destroy them.”

They entered firing range, and in that instant each cruiser fired its primary batteries, a quartet of forward-pointing one hundred and twenty centimeters plasma lasers specially designed to burn through an enemy's hull in no time. Sixteen massive beams licked the destroyers' hull, scorching and boring through ceramics and metal alike, turning interior compartments into furnaces where they struck. One of the cruisers took a nuclear missile fired by the
Sunchaser
, its bow erupting into a miniature sun, but not before she and her sisters had turned the two destroyers into floating clouds of gas.

“
New target,” Natara rattled off, blocking her mind from thinking about the hundreds of her own people that nuke must have killed. “Go for the scout cruiser! Fire when ready.”

“
Distance ten thousand and closing!” Torok Sen warned.

Outnumbered and outgunned the Dominion warship nonetheless fought on ferociously, filling the blackness of space with nuclear warheads and streaking plasma beams reaching out towards the Republican cruisers and frigates. Lashing out like a mad animal it broke through their formation even as the Érenni weapons battered its own hull. One of the frigates popped like a balloon.

“He's trying to outrun us,” Batal said not without a strange sense of appreciation. Not having an Ashani go for a murder-suicide charge was a welcome change to him.

“
But not fast enough,” Torok Sen added. “We've got him.”

The other Republican cruiser, its bow still spewing flaming plasma and atmosphere, had fallen back. Heavily damaged from a warhead several hundred megatons strong, her sides were still intact, as were the weapons mounted there. She rolled wildly around her own axis, her lasers darting out at the passing enemy cruiser in quick succession, some of them punching right through it. The
Sunchaser
raced on for a few seconds, seemingly unfazed. Then its hull bucked like a horse in half a dozen directions at the same time. Geysers of liquid flame pierced it from the inside, pouring out into the void as a fiery trail.

It flew on for a few long seconds that felt like hours to Natara as she watched the strange beauty of it all play out in her displays aboard PERISAI's bridge. The enemy cruiser was still a dozen million kilometers away from the outer boundaries of the minefields when it blew apart in a silent explosion. “Well done, everybody,” she said calmly.

“We're been recalled,” Torok Sen nodded towards the communications officer. “And high command sends congratulations on a job well done.”

Natara acknowledged the signal without any emotion. A few weeks ago she would have been disturbed at being applauded for killing what must have been at least a thousand living creatures. But after what she and the people aboard PERISAI had experienced at the Battle of Senfina, the Érenni mindset had shifted dramatically. And while their core beliefs might remain the same, they had been superseded by a stronger imperative: the need to survive. The defense of their home system would be more active and aggressive than the actions at Senfina. With whatever advice the Tuathaan had to offer, and with the cold knowledge of what was at stake for them, the Érenni were ready to face the Ashani a second time. They would not be surprised twice.

Akvô, Home world of the Érenni Republics.

“I'll be sorry to leave,” Tarek Winters face was heavy with fatigue as he spoke. “But I've got to think of my crew. I wish there was more we could do.”

“
Understood, IRON MAIDEN,” a voice replied in the traditional female tones of the Érenni.

Tarek had been out here a year and only ever met a handful of males.

“Tell your people what is happening here. Make them understand.”

“
We'll try,” Tarek replied solemnly. “We'll give our stories to the newsfeed agencies, to everybody willing to listen. What's happened out here is terrifying, Control. The galaxy needs to know the peril they are all in.”

“
Be safe,”" the traffic controller said. “We've heard you risked yourselves at Senfina for some of our civilians. Captain Natara of the cruiser PERISAI told us the story.”

Tarek had never met the controller, had never even spoken to her before, and yet she knew what they had done. Strangely enough, it must be what stars felt when they experienced their fame for the first time. The difference for Tarek being that he was known for surviving a horrific battle which – if he had had a choice – he'd have been nowhere near. It struck him that if they hadn't stayed for that one last job those two thousand refugees would still have been on Senfina and would be dead by now. He'd regretted that decision to stay because it cost him a fortune in repair bills and almost got them killed, but it had also saved a lot of lives. He finally started to recognize that maybe it had been the best thing he had ever done in his long life. “We were just in the right place at the wrong time,” he answered. “It wasn't anything special.”

“Captain Natara has put you forward for the Republican Star, the highest award of our people,” he controller continued as calmly as before. “It is a true honor.”

“
Well, I mean, thanks,” Tarek stumbled over his tongue. Jesus, he was just a freight hauler! How the hell did he end up an Érenni national hero? “It's kinda, well, surprising.” It made him feel awkward. He just wanted to get the hell out of there.

“
It'll be here, waiting for you and your crew,” the officer replied in that same calm tone. “We've plotted a course for you through the minefield. Follow our guide beam.”

“
Thanks, Control, and good luck to you,” Tarek spoke evenly, but he was beginning to feel the weight of the situation creep up on him. “We'll be back here one day.”

“
We'll be here, waiting. Akvô Control out.”

For a full minute Tarek said nothing. He had heard the slight tremble in that last exchange and knew what it meant. Akvô would be waiting. But would there still be an Érenni people to welcome them back?

Beside him Rául was also quiet as the IRON MAIDEN left orbit and headed for the gate, its engines groaning but obeying. The whole ship stank of adhesives, of ozone and lubricants. Some sections were still sealed off, being open to space. Still, overall the ship was operational again. Llyr had returned with the freighter's cargo shuttle and a few spares he had acquired. Even so they would need a long stop at Tanith to make the journey back to Earth. And there they would have to put in some serious yard time to get the old lady back to form.

“
So, they're going to give us medals?” Rául finally said to start a conversation.

“
Guess so,” Tarek said curtly, in no mood to talk. His face remained hard as stone to mask his inner turmoil.

“
So we'll have to come back this way, to collect them?”

Tarek sighed in resignation. “I know you want to stay and help, but this isn't the time. Anyone who stays here is going to die.”

“What? No way!” Rául protested. “They can't!”

“
Tell that to the Dominion,” Tarek growled, running a harried hand through his curly hair. He sure had taken on some gray during the past weeks. “You've seen up close what the Ashani are like. They're going to send a hell of a lot more ships here than they did at Senfina, and you know how they handled that planet: nukes and germs. The Érenni might hold out longer, bleed them more, but in the end they just can't win this fight.” It was a conclusion he had come to almost as soon as they had arrived but refused to accept until just a few hours ago. He
liked
the Érenni. They were good people. He had worked and lived with them this past year, made friends with them, helped them in their time of need. And yet, the simple reality was that if the Dominion showed up here in force they would crush the forces arrayed around Akvô, and then the Érenni race would die.

“
And that's it? We just leave?”

“
Haven't you heard anything I've said?” Tarek snapped, tired and frustrated. “We stay, we die.
Period
. This whole system is going to be a slaughterhouse and we aren't going to be in it!”

“
We leave them to die, then?” Rául said angrily. “Is that the sort of people we are?”

“
Damn straight, that's who we are!” Tarek laughed, a sound tinged not with mirth but with loathing. “We run, we hide, we stay the hell out of the firing line because we aren't heroes, no matter what medals they throw at us! We are here for the money, not to throw away our lives in a gesture! We're going home.”

“
We can't just leave them to die, not after helping them before!” Rául replied. “We aren't completely powerless here!”

“
Wrong, that's exactly what we are!” Tarek slammed his fist on the chair, surprising Rául. “We're completely powerless; there is absolutely nothing we can do to change this, not a damn thing!” He stared ahead, the red line marking the end of the star's inner gravity well creeping closer in his main plot. “If I could wave a wand and make the Ashani go away I would. And you know something? Even if it cost my life, if it meant saving that planet I'd do it in a heartbeat. But it wouldn't, we can't do a damn thing and it's burning me up to just walk away from this but:
we don't have a choice
. You want to go and die with them out of sympathy? You know, that's just plain stupid and I won't allow it.”

“
You won't allow it?” Rául scoffed. “What gives you the right to tell me when and where I'll die?”

“
Because you're my crew. That's all the right I need,” Tarek said calmly. “I've got a responsibility as captain to get this ship and everyone on it to safety, and that includes you, Rául.”

Rául didn't answer straight away. The silence returned to hang heavy over the freighter's bridge.

“I appreciate you looking out for us,” Rául said finally. “But we can make our own decisions, you know. I'd like to stay and help the Érenni.”

“
I know, but you're what? Twenty, twenty five? You've got a lifetime ahead of you and you deserve it. It's better this way, and if the Érenni will let us leave then we should just go. They won't want our deaths on their hands."