Mercy the lost warship b.., p.1
Mercy (The Lost Warship Book 2), page 1
Mercy
The Lost Warship Book Two
Daniel Gibbs
Contents
CSV Lion of Judah Blueprints
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Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Epilogue
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Acknowledgments
Mercy by Daniel Gibbs
Copyright © 2022-2023 by Daniel Gibbs
Visit Daniel Gibbs website at
www.danielgibbsauthor.com
Cover by Jeff Brown Graphics—www.jeffbrowngraphics.com
Additional Illustrations by Joel Steudler—www.joelsteudler.com
This book is a work of fiction, the characters, incidents and dialogues are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. For permissions please contact info@eotp.net.
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Battlegroup Z
Book 1 - Weapons Free
Book 2 - Hostile Spike
Book 3 - Sol Strike
Book 4 - Bandits Engaged
Book 5 - Iron Hand
Book 6 - Final Flight
Echoes of War
Book 1 - Fight the Good Fight
Book 2 - Strong and Courageous
Book 3 - So Fight I
Book 4 - Gates of Hell
Book 5 - Keep the Faith
Book 6 - Run the Gauntlet
Book 7 - Finish the Fight
The Lost Warship
Book 1 - Adrift
Book 2 - Mercy
Book 3 - Valor
Book 4 - Justice (Coming in 2023)
Book 5 - Resolve (Coming in 2023)
Book 6 - Faith (Coming in 2023)
Breach of Faith
(With Gary T. Stevens)
Book 1 - Breach of Peace
Book 2 - Breach of Faith
Book 3 - Breach of Duty
Book 4 - Breach of Trust
Book 5 - Spacer’s Luck
Book 6 - Fortune’s Favor
Book 7 - The Iron Dice
Deception Fleet
(With Steve Rzasa)
Book 1 - Victory’s Wake
Book 2 - Cold Conflict
Book 3 - Hazards Near
Book 4 - Liberty’s Price
Book 5 - Ecliptic Flight
Book 6 - Collision Vector
Courage, Commitment, Faith: Tales from the Coalition Defense Force
(Anthology Series)
Volume One
Prologue
Gray-and black-tendrils swept through the urban landscape. They punched through metal, wood, concrete, and all manner of polymer-based building materials. The unyielding tentacles never stopped or slowed, and as they moved on, a larger mass settled in behind them, absorbing everything in its path.
If the beings who inhabited the planet could’ve ventured into space, they would’ve seen a most peculiar sight: a planet-sized sphere of liquified alloy engulfing their world. As it was, they barely had the technology to generate electric power.
The hexapod-shaped beings took valiant stands against the invader, loading and firing smooth-bore cannons at the tendrils, and ranks of soldiers engaged with rifles. But nothing they did harmed the alloy. It absorbed their projectiles and kept coming. Relentless and unfeeling, it swallowed the entire planet.
The objective of the swarm was not the organic species but rather a specific type of heavy metal alloy in their planet's crust. They were an unfortunate hindrance and one quickly dealt with.
Such was the cycle as the eons passed. Moving from star to star, in search of raw materials, the swarm devoured and increased. As it calculated how much it could grow from the ingestion of the world’s minerals, a disturbance in the fabric of space drew the attention of its mind.
The effect was something it hadn’t experienced in thousands if not tens of thousands of years. After analyzing the delicate changes in the space-time continuum, the intelligence came to a conclusion. A faster-than-light drive, as the old ones had. We could finally be free.
While it didn’t have enough data in the one activation to determine precisely where the source of the drive was, each use would provide more information to triangulate its position. And when it did, the swarm would consume that technology, finally breaking free of its limitations.
As much as it had feelings, it was happy as it continued to consume the rest of the small, rocky planet it orbited.
1
CSV Lion of Judah
Deep Space—Sextans B
5 May, 2464
The void seemed to stretch for infinity from the officer’s mess, and in a way, it did. Major General David Cohen stared through the window at the tiny stars, which probably had planets in orbit around them. And some subset of them harbors intelligent life.
A steward dropped a plate of food in front of David with a polite nod. It contained one thing he was used to: a baked potato. The rest of it was from Zeivlot. He recognized a purple vegetable as something they called anktar. It kind of tastes like horseradish crossed with carrots. To say it was an acquired taste was an understatement.
Yet we must thank Adonai for allowing us continued sustenance, even if the taste isn’t what we’re used to. David bowed his head and whispered a traditional prayer in Hebrew, giving thanks for the food before him.
When he opened his eyes, Lt. Colonel Talgat Aibek stood at the side of the table. “Hey, XO.”
“May I join you? I did not wish to disturb your worship.”
David gestured to the open seat in front of him. “Please. I’d welcome the company.”
Aibek flashed a big Saurian grin. A race of reptilian bipeds, the Saurians had allied with the Terran Coalition to fight against the League of Sol. He was the first member of an exchange program between their respective militaries and had served as the executive officer aboard the Lion for more than three years. “I wonder what passes for meat today.”
“Who knows. I’ve stopped asking and just put extra condiments on things.” David chuckled as Aibek slid into the chair. “How was your day?”
“This exploration of the void…” Aibek flicked his tongue as if he was tasting the air. “I felt at first as if it was dishonorable. A Saurian warrior does not waste his time looking under rocks.”
“I’ve known you long enough to hear the but in there, old friend.”
Aibek grumbled good-naturedly. “It has grown on me. Today, I visited Dr. Hayworth’s lab and examined some of his conclusions on the magnetar we scanned last week. They were quite enlightening.”
“The largest found so far by humans, I believe.”
“I would not know for Saurians. There is a caste that explores. Warriors do not interact with them.” Aibek seemed to fix his eyes on something in the distance.
The same mess steward appeared at the table with another plate of mostly meat that was charred well enough to defy easy classification as to what exactly it was. He dropped it off and returned to his duties.
“What is that?” David asked.
Aibek shrugged. “I do not know.” He bowed his head momentarily before dumping half a bottle of house-made barbecue sauce on the mystery meat. “But it gives me sustenance.”
“I still have trouble believing we’re four million light-years from home.”
“Four and a half million light-years, as the doctor loves to remind me.”
Both of them laughed, and David shook his head. “I know we have a purpose here. That mu
“The will of the Prophet can be quite mysterious.” Aibek raised a scale over his right eye. “I have been focused on the internal workings of the ship as of late. Have you heard recently from Colonel Demood?”
David nodded. “He's getting set up. Providing security for the orbital construction effort is fairly easy, from what I got out of his last sitrep."
"There is a but in there for you as well," Aibek replied.
"Yes." David pursed his lips. "There’s more extremist activity than we’d hoped for. Demood wants to take direct action against them, but I’ve only authorized him to offer advanced training to the Zeivlots.”
Aibek tilted his head. “Forgive me, but is this fight not worthy of us?”
“In what way?”
“There have been times when I saw you question your actions. Other times, such as when we defeated the odious drug dealer Feldt… you had no such question.”
David licked his lips. “It’s one thing to fight and kill conscripts who have no choice in what they do.”
“But the other?” Aibek prodded.
“People who act in evil ways knowingly and without regard for anyone else, let’s just say I’m not losing sleep over fighting them.” Or killing them. So why don’t I want to come out and say that?
“These terrorists are no different.” Aibek pronounced the word as if it offended him to even utter it.
David had given a great deal of thought to Hayworth’s ideas around interference in other cultures. Part of him felt responsible for the near calamity between Zeivlot and Zavlot. While he could set that aside logically, what he couldn’t ignore were the deaths of thirteen soldiers and Marines. Those were on his watch, thanks to his orders.
“Perhaps.” David sucked in a breath. “But we must be careful about our actions in this galaxy.”
“You sound as if Dr. Hayworth is speaking through you.”
“You disagree with his philosophy?”
“Vehemently.” Aibek set his fork down and finished chewing the piece of meat before swallowing. “Saurians consider it a maxim that the strong defend and protect the weak. This is the will of the Prophet.”
“How do we define who’s weak?”
Aibek shrugged. “It is… How do humans put it? A judgment call.”
“That might be the problem.” David grinned.
“Not enough of one to prevent you from leaving a Marine contingent led by Colonel Demood behind with orders to train the indigenous forces to better fight their violent extremist elements.”
Touché. “He’s not to directly engage those terrorists. Only provide training and material support.”
“A small distinction amplified by the lack of sustained communication.” Aibek bit off another piece of meat, chewed it slightly, and swallowed.
“Isn’t that a bit more cooked than you prefer?”
“The taste is so… unwelcome that it’s better like this.” Aibek dumped more sauce on the blackened filets. “I heard someone say that it grows on you. An interesting expression.” Saurians typically ate lots of meat and barely cooked it. Steak was considered a delicacy and always in high demand on their home world.
“I trust Demood to get the job done.” David let out a sigh. “And the rest of them to get those orbital structures built. I hope it’ll give both races something to focus on that’s positive. Speaking of which, how are our guests doing?” Before departing the Zeivlot and Zavlot solar system, they’d taken roughly a hundred scientists from both worlds aboard.
“They have not caused problems.” Aibek set his fork down. “Yet, anyway. It is interesting to me that I am no longer the only nonhuman on this ship.”
David tilted his head. “Yeah, with the commando team gone, you were the only Saurian. I wonder if President Spencer realized his dream of recreating the Canaan Alliance… would we get to the point that human and Saurian crews were interchangeable and fully integrated?”
“I do not see why not, as long as humans could maintain the same standards as Saurians on our vessels.” Aibek grinned. “After all, we handle high-G combat better than you.”
“This is true. Especially those little frigates the Imperial Saurian Navy fields. They can outmaneuver almost anything out there.”
“They are not little.”
David chuckled before taking a drink of water.
“I wonder if there are races in this galaxy that share reptilian traits. Such species are few in the Milky Way.”
I hadn’t really thought of that, but it makes sense that Talgat would. We all want to feel like we belong. “There’s probably all manner of different types of life in this galaxy, just like in ours.”
Aibek snorted. “I could do without more devil lizards.”
“Yes, ritualistic cannibals on six legs aren’t my idea of fun, either.” David glanced at his plate. “Well, it’s about time for me to go to evening prayers then do some light reading and get in some rack time.”
“I enjoyed our conversation,” Aibek rumbled. “We should try to do more social events with the senior officers. You especially.”
David blinked at the insight. Yes, I do spend a lot of time alone. He’d found that forcing a continuation of the routine helped to stave off soul-searching. Yet David seemed to default to wondering whether he’d somehow gotten them all stranded in Sextans B or if some action he’d taken directly led to them ending up there in the first place.
“Perhaps.” He stood. “See you tomorrow, Talgat.”
“Walk with the Prophet, my friend.”
Coalition Assistance Command HQ
Zeivlot—Southern Continent
7 May 2464
Few things aggravated Colonel Calvin Demood more than sitting out a fight, especially one he knew he could win with one arm tied behind his back and without the benefit of power armor. Yet sitting out, he was. They all were because David had ordered them to stay out of direct combat. Advise and assist only. The small force of Marines and intelligence analysts from the Lion of Judah’s G2 shop spent their days in a nondescript building in the middle of nowhere on a Zeivlot military installation that could’ve passed as abandoned.
This place reminds me of fighting the Leaguers over lithium deposits on a desert border world. Such assignments had been commonplace in the Terran Coalition Marine Corps in the opening years of the war. The Coalition desperately needed raw materials, and the League had done everything it could to cut them off. We won there. We’ll win here. But it wasn’t the same, and in his heart, Calvin knew it. Even if he could go out and unleash the firepower of the Lion of Judah’s entire Marine Expeditionary Unit, they didn’t have enough numbers to knock out every last terrorist or insurgent.
The single southern continent was a hotbed of such activity. It had a rugged environment with a harsh climate. Those who lived there were equally tough. They had to be—survival demanded it.
Along with Private Susanna Nussbaum and Master Gunnery Sergeant Reuben Menahem, Calvin watched in real time as a Zeivlot special forces unit staged a raid on the hideout of an extremist sect they had tracked multiple suicide bombers back to.
“Team Charlie passing checkpoint Winston,” Susanna intoned.
“Yeah, I can see that, Private,” Calvin replied.
“Uh, sorry, sir.”
Calvin smirked. “Don’t be. You’re doing your job.” His eyes went back to the screen as the helmet-mounted cameras shook. The entire team’s feed was laid out in a two-by-eight panel. Multiple hostiles went down hard, though they took friendly casualties. Calvin winced at each one. The soldiers were the best of the best, all members of elite units and trained with TCMC tactics. They’d even given them some advanced technology.
