The Voyage of the Star Wolf (14 page)

“Think big, Chief. If we can kill the
Dragon Lord
, we can get home.” Korie added, “Now, listen—for this to work, time is going to be critical. To drop a torpedo and then activate it gives the enemy at least fifteen more seconds of warning. We've got two active torpedoes. Pull them out of the tubes, attach one to the forward spar, one to the rear. Make it look like we're trying to use them as engines. Pull the access panels off them. It'll make us seem even
more
desperate. Then, if we have a chance to use them, they're already released.”

“They'll never buy it,” said Leen.

“Yes, they will,” said Korie. “Because the whole thing is so outrageous, it won't occur to them that it's a ploy.”

Leen scowled. “How much time do I have?”

“Four hours, maybe five.”

“Mm.” The chief engineer held his hands apart and looked at the space between them, almost as if he were weighing the job. He grunted. “Yeah, I can do it. I'll have to lock down the entire port side of the ship. We'll use the starboard network for everything. Oh, and I'd better retrieve the G-scanners too.”

“Good idea—that'll let them think our scanning lens was our first attempt to take a look around. Wait till the last minute though. Let HARLIE keep his eyes as long as possible.”

“Okay. I have to run this by HARLIE anyway and see if I've missed anything. You want the hole to look like an explosion, right?”

“Right.”

“Okay, but I don't want to set a bomb. I'm going to do this with a team of cutters. That okay by you?”

“Just so it looks good.”

“It'll look better than good. It'll look horrible. All right, let me go talk to HARLIE. As soon as the procedures are locked in, I'll report back to you. Thirty minutes, max. Oh, one more thing—”

“Yes, Chief?”

“Have I told you how much I really
hate
this idea?”

“Yes, I believe you have.”

“Good. Just so you don't forget.”

“There they are. They're coming in,” Hodel pointed.

The display showed an uncertain ripple closing rapidly on the
LS-1187
.

“Took 'em long enough,” Korie complained. “Think we have nothing better to do than sit here and wait for them to come after us. Okay, go to red alert.” He glanced up. “HARLIE, ETA?”

“Estimated time of arrival: thirty minutes.”

Korie looked to his acting executive officer. “All right. The conn is yours. I'm going to suit up.” But before he pushed off toward the aft airlock, he stopped himself. “Listen, Mike, if I don't make it—get this ship home in one piece. No more heroics, okay?”

“Hey—if you don't make it,
we
don't make it.”

Korie held Hodel's gaze. “I
mean
it.”

“Yes, sir,” Hodel conceded. “Besides, there isn't anything left to be heroic with.”

“You could always throw rocks at them.”

“But we'll have to bring our own rocks, I know.” Hodel called abruptly, “Mr. Korie?”

“Eh?”

“Good luck.”

Korie flashed a thumbs-up signal to Mike Hodel and pushed himself off toward the aft airlock.

His starsuit was waiting for him in a mounting frame, arms and legs held out as if ready for a crucifixion. The monitor panel above it was glowing green. The starsuit was a body glove, so skintight that it was commonly joked that no man's religion was a secret anymore. The first time he heard it, Korie had to ask to have the joke explained. He still found it embarrassing. Also untrue. Most men wore protective codpieces under their starsuits anyway.

Li was already suited up; the man was short and wiry; in his helmet, he looked like an oversized elf in bright green underwear. He looked up from the work station he was monitoring and waved at Korie.

Korie peeled off his T-shirt and his shorts and his soft-soled shoes. He grabbed the top of the frame with both hands and levered his feet
into the tight leggings of the starsuit, sliding himself into the elastic material like a snake trying to get back into its own skin. Li floated up behind him and placed his gloved hands on Korie's shoulders, anchored his feet on the ceiling, and pushed. Korie
popped
into the suit and it began sealing itself automatically. He ducked his head forward and up into the helmet and then pulled it down into place, locking it against the shoulder clasps.

“—hear me yet?” came Li's voice, a little too loud. Korie winced and flipped open his right forearm panel and adjusted his volume control.

“A little too loud and clear,” said Korie. He glanced up at the monitor panel. “Am I green yet?”

“Still closing,” answered the weapons specialist. “You're yellow . . . holding at yellow . . . there she goes. You're green.”

“All right, let's go.” Korie switched to the all-talk channel. “Everybody in place?”

“Confirmed.”

Korie and Li stepped into the airlock and sealed the door. Korie hit the red button and the atmosphere began cycling out of the chamber. A moment later, the external door slid open, revealing the bright naked stars.

The two men worked their way around the hull of the vessel toward the gaping hole on its port side. Each one carried a pack that looked like a tool kit. Each also had a small disruptor rifle strapped to his back.

The axis rotation of the ship had been halted and the G-scanners retrieved. Now, they were hidden inside the starship's fluctuator spines. Korie and Li floated silently past the port fin.

“Mr. Korie—?” Hodel's voice.

“Talk to me.”

“They've taken up a position a hundred thousand kilometers away. We have them on visual. Channel D. As you predicted, they're releasing probes.”

“Thanks,” Korie replied. As curious as he was, Korie waited until he and Hodel arrived at the rip in the
LS-1187
's hull. Leen was right. He'd made it look
horrible
. Korie wondered if perhaps he hadn't overdone it.

He anchored himself to the hull of the ship and punched for Channel D; the inside of his helmet refocused to show him the reprocessed view from the ship's telescope.

The enemy vessel was large enough not to be a pinpoint, but it was distant enough not to be a clear image either. The view was blurry and uncertain.

Korie grunted. “Well, at least we can see them now. I'm sure we'll all get a better look before this is over. After their probes see how bad off we are, they'll move in closer. For the kill—or the capture. Everybody be patient. If we were to fire anything from this distance, they'd see it and pop back into hyperstate before it could arrive on target. Then they'd hit us with their fringe. Everybody relax and keep your stations green. There's going to be a lot of waiting.” He cleared the image.

“Li?”

“Both torpedoes are ready.” He handed Korie a remote unit. “Flip the plastic cover and the unit arms itself. Press the green button and the fish wake up and go to standby. Targeting will be automatic for any mass larger than the
LS-1187
. Press the red button and they go. Breakaway is automatic. I've got a duplicate box, and Hodel is patched into the circuit too.”

“Good.” Korie clipped the box to his belt.

“The first of the probes are arriving,” Hodel announced. “They're looking at us with everything they've got. It's a full-spectrum scan. You guys should smile and wave. They're looking at the labels on your underwear.”

“It's all right,” said Li. “I'm not wearing any underwear.”

“Sure—give the Morthans a thrill,” said Hodel.

“Or a scare,” added Korie, with a grin. “Well, did they get a good look?”

“They're still looking—”

“Whoops, I can confirm that,” Korie said. One of the probes was suddenly visible in the distance. It was approaching the side of the
LS-1187
, moving almost directly toward Korie and the hole in the hull. It was a chunky-looking thing, almost deliberately unaesthetic. Lenses and antennae protruded from it like porcupine quills. A single small high-intensity mass-driver looked as if it had been inserted directly through the center of the unit. Out of the corner of his eye, Korie saw another probe approaching the bow of the ship and focusing on the torpedo there.

The closer probe came to a halt uncomfortably close to Korie—only a dozen meters away. Korie could see its lenses swiveling and refocusing as it photographed the damage to the ship. “Let them get a good look,” said Korie, whispering in spite of himself. Slowly, pulled the disruptor rifle off his back and armed it; but he did not point it at the probe. Not yet . . .

“Can I express an opinion?” asked Li.

“Go ahead,” said Korie.

Li faced the probe head on, raised his right fist before him, and slowly, elegantly, extended his middle finger.

The probe did not react immediately. Then one lens after another swiveled to study Li's defiant posture. Despite himself, Korie aimed his weapon.

Suddenly the probe flashed—a single bright flare of energy. The beam was invisible, but Li exploded instantly. From the center out, he ballooned and shredded.

Korie reacted in the same instant. Screaming, he squeezed the trigger. The probe disintegrated. He whirled to fire on the second one, but it was already exploding. Hodel had caught it with the bow guns.

And then there was silence. The pieces of flesh and bone and plastic spun away into the darkness and were lost forever.

The loudest sound in the universe was Korie's own choking breath inside his helmet. He was screaming. He was swearing. He was incoherent. The words were bubbling in rage and spittle. Everything was red—

“Sir!” Hodel was screaming in his ear. “Are you all right?”

Korie heard the words and couldn't answer. He wanted to pound something. He wanted to hurt someone, anyone. He would have smashed his fist into the face of God—

“I'm . . . okay,” he said. “Just don't say anything for a minute.”

“Sir? They're moving in.”

“I got it,” said Korie. He took a sip of water.
I gave him permission. I told him he could do it
! He spoke and his voice was a rasp. “Don't anybody else express an opinion. Ever. I mean it. I'm not joking.”

Hodel did not reply.

After a moment, Korie asked, “Where are they now?”

“Closing fast in real space. High-gee acceleration.”

“That's to intimidate us.”

“It's working.”

“ETA?”

“Three minutes.”

Korie switched his helmet to pick up the visual again. The image was clearer now; still blurry, but resolving sharper and sharper as he watched.

At first, she was just a pattern of light, an orange blur, a flame-colored presence. Then she began to take shape, an angular, dragon-headed wedge; she filled out with detail. She showed her teeth, she was all points and edges, and she was studded with quills and embers. She opened her eyes and glared. She was the
beast
, and her masters knew it. The gigantic numbers on her side were
666
. Her face was painted like a dragon from Hell.