Back into the fire, p.18
Back Into the Fire, page 18
“Rodann...” Josie pulled at him again. “You’ve got to move!”
Someone shoved past Jerry, jarred him out of his funk. He shook himself once and looked at Josie. “Can’t believe it. She’s never done this to me!”
“Who? The little witch?”
“She doesn’t like being called that,” Jerry started with an unexpected surge of almost paternal defensiveness.
But Josie was chortling—and still pulling on him. “Well, they’re going to be counting on the Hog being up there, full crew or not.”
He started into a lumbering jog in the direction of his ship, Josie cajoling him along at his side. The whole thing felt like a kick to the stomach, and he still reeling after it, fighting for balance. The AI could run the tail gun, for sure, but it wasn’t the same. Cory was...better than the machine. More, he hated admitting to himself, he preferred having her close, where he knew what was happening to her.
A Hellhound lifted off ahead of them, kicking up a donut of debris that momentarily blinded, set both Jerry and Josie to hunching and turning away. Ears rang with the scream and Jerry felt the antigravity cushion nearly shove him over. Then it was gone and the air was clear. And they were moving, once more, the Hog visible, one more row of parked fighters over.
Jerry slowed as he neared the cockpit and saw Josie scrambling aft. “Hey! What the hell are you doing?”
She stopped and spun to face him, voice raised to be heard and blonde mop lashing about her face. “More good than I’d be doing otherwise!”
“You can’t be serious.” Jerry stepped towards her. “You ever operate one of those?”
“I’m qualified on more weapon systems than you even know exist, Rodann!” she snapped back into his face.
Protests cooled at the heat in her voice. He chuckled, couldn’t help it. “What about your Raiders?”
“They’ll understand,” she replied. “Hell, most of ‘em would do the same! It’s no fun squatting in a bunker while friends and more” she put extra emphasis on the last word “are out there, risking their tails.”
A little bit of Jerry still fought it. But looking at her, fists clenched at her hips, wind blowing her hair back from her face to leave her blue eyes blazing free, the urge to grab her, give in to what she was pressing for, slammed him. He wanted her along.
He wanted her.
Fighting to keep a tremor from his voice, he said, “You’ll have no time to figure the systems out.”
She smirked. “I know which end’s the business end.”
He grinned back. “Then jump in and buckle up, baby.”
“YOU’RE SURE?” KELLY asked the globular of Cory, staring with odd detachment out of the hologram.
“We have multiple contacts confirmed,” she replied. “You need to return your Wing.”
Kelly pinched her lips together and forced herself to nod. Every bit of her recoiled at the idea, filled her stomach with an acidy burn. She glanced at the aft display, at Kimball’s Hellhound, visibly struggling to match speeds with hers. The faint glow of the smoke trail it left in its wake roped through the night, a trail leading back to wounded prey.
“Your Third Squadron is nearing orbit,” Cory said, not exactly pressing; not sounding human, at all. “Inbound Alliance forces will reach the same in approximately sixty-five minutes.”
“And we don’t want to let them get anywhere near that close.” Kelly clenched her teeth for a moment, then relaxed and blew out a breath. “Understood. On my way.”
The globular of Cory vanished without another word.
Pressure must be getting to her, Kelly thought. She glanced again at Kimball. Getting to us all... She hated herself as she touched the communicator, changed channels. “Hey, Kimball.”
A new globular materialized, showed the other Jester’s pale, pain-drawn face. Smoke twined about him and sweat beaded across narrow, bony features, darkened a strand of his normally white-blonde hair. “Gotta go, Commander?”
Kelly couldn’t help but wince. “Afraid so. We’ve got more guests coming. They need everyone.”
“Don’t worry about me,” he replied with cheer that sounded tight and forced. “I’ll carry this bucket home.”
“Let the AI do the work. Don’t force yourself.”
“AI’s fried, Commander. Half the instruments, too. It’s going to be all Kimball flying this thing back.”
Shit. She pressed her lips together again. “Then it’s a good thing you know the way.”
“All the way,” he chuckled and then grimaced, was clearly hurting.
“If you...” Kelly trailed off, the words dragging out of her like splinters. “I’m sorry about this, Kimball.”
“Don’t be,” he replied. “It’s the job. We all know how it goes sometimes. Just make sure if I...if I have to put her down somewhere, that you send the Raiders. It’s going to get awfully lonely you know?”
“They’ll be tracking your position from the Hole. No one’s leaving you.”
“Thanks, Commander. I’ll see you soon.”
“Damned right, you will,” she replied. “Good luck!”
“To both of us.”
Kelly drew back on the stick and lifted the Hellhound’s nose for the heavens. Grav drive shudders built through the spaceframe, the fighter feeling almost hasty as it climbed. Or maybe that’s just me, in a damned hurry to get away, God help me. She didn’t look back at the lone icon of Kimball crossing over the hostile, benighted landscape of Fury, but could see it behind her eyes, nevertheless.
“Computer,” she asked her own AI, “estimate from your sensors Harrison Six’s odds of reaching the Hole.”
“Scans were largely inconclusive,” the machine replied with a hint of something almost regretful. “With Six’s simulacrum crippled, I couldn’t link and run a remote diagnostic. But visible scan suggests no better than an even chance of reaching Jester headquarters before critical mechanical failure occurs.” The AI surprised her by adding, “I am sorry, Commander Harrison.”
She smiled a little, didn’t know if the machine actually felt that—or anything—but appreciated the simulation of human concern.
She still hated every single meter they climbed across the sky, leaving Kimball behind.
“HERE THEY COME.”
A swarm of blips rose from the surface of Fury and quickly gathered in orbit, on the planet’s near side, over the horizon from any serious anti-orbital fire from Alliance positions. As Harrison watched, the icons began to accelerate away from the planet. Two, then three distinct groups seemed to sort out.
“They’re leaving a reserve,” Harrison murmured, noting the last group, which remained in far orbit. “You don’t think they’ve picked up Caldicott?” He glanced at Woodruf. “Or us?”
“Not possible,” the Commander replied with surety Harrison was too old and experienced to ever feel about anything. She reached over the tech at the Tactical station and touched one of his controls. In response, a holographic pointer fluttered over the third group and a globular popped out, showed a boxy, weapons-studded craft. “Assault shuttles, sir, Basilisk-class. Looks like they’ve fitted them for anti-starfighter work. And they’re slower than those Jester Hellhounds.” She nodded to Harrison. “They’re there should anything get through.”
Which was assuredly going to happen. Nagumo was launching his Valkyries now, the Daimyo filling the void around it with its starfighter brood. These sorted themselves out as Harrison watched for what seemed endless minutes. Two groups split up, one vastly larger one beginning to peel away from the slower capital ships, pick up speed as they headed for Fury. A second, far smaller one clustered around the task force—Nagumo’s Near space combat patrol, his own reserve.
Harrison snorted a little to himself. Both sides were mirroring one another in tactics. A small worried nibbled at his gut. Both sides weren’t trusting that they’d seen the entirety of the other’s full strength.
“Are we picking up anything from Fury?” Harrison asked. “Anything from General Gamble’s people planet-side?”
“Lots of racket, sir,” the technician at the Communications station replied. “Sounds like there’s been some fighting. They’re broadcasting a general distress signal.” The tech listened to his earbud for a moment, manipulated a channel toggle. “There’s been an airstrike and their primary supply depot has been destroyed and the last of their aerospace support is wiped out. They’re calling for help.”
Harrison tensed. “They’re not picking us up, are they?”
“No, sir,” the tech replied. “It’s open frequency chatter. It’s desperation. They’re broadcasting to any who’ll listen.”
Folding his arms before him, Harrison nodded and tried to project calm he certainly didn’t feel. It was madness, waiting like this, watching the slow-motion ballet of icons, which were in fact people and machines hurtling towards one another at insane velocities. Only the vast distance gave them the illusion of gracefulness.
It had to be worse for Nagumo, Harrison told himself. The man would have no idea either Caldicott or his own group had gotten into position on time. He had to feeling like bloody meat in shark-infested waters. His force could likely could hold off the Jesters, but not defeat them. And if luck went against him, he was looking at serious exposure. All he had was the planet and its defenders in front of him and the hope that his comrades would be there when needed.
“We could risk a line-of-sight laser comm to Caldicott’s estimated position,” Walsh suggested from his chair. “It would at least confirm positions.”
At the Captain’s suggestion, the third planet out, a gas giant with a weird cat’s eye pattern in its twisting whorls of upper atmosphere, blinked. Its position relative to Fury—and, therefore, Caldicott’s spot, hiding in its shadow for her chance—would place an attack from that quarter coming in at almost a right angle to the axis of the Jester’s counter thrust.
A perfect ambush—if everything had gone according to plan.
But Harrison shook his head. “Not worth it. It’d be impossible to intercept, but at this range we’d have to boost power to get the signal anywhere and that would be noticed.” He chewed his lower lip. “No, we just have to wait and assume everyone’s where they need to be.
“We need to trust the plan.”
“THEY’RE GOING TO TRY to rush right through us,” Red said across the Jesters’ network. “You can tell by how much speed they’re putting on.”
Tim glanced at the tactical hologram. In its holographic depths, the mob of oncoming Valkyries had, indeed, broken into a sprint. It was at least two squadrons, a couple dozen starfighters. He felt a thrill of icy wind rush across nerves, tingle in his lungs as he worked to control his breathing. He never used to get quite this nervy, in the old days, when they were mostly fighting the hunter-killer drones of the galactic mega-corporations that used to be the Jesters’ primary prey. But the knowledge that these were people, thinking, hating humans, coming to kill him, always added a sickening thrust.
It always felt personal.
“Watkins Wing,” Red said, “Tim, I want you to rush right through them.”
He grinned. “Gonna give me another chance at one of those carriers?”
“I’m going to give you the chance to scare the shit out of them,” she replied. “We can’t let any of those Valkyries near the planet.” The globular blinked with dotted lines, instructions relayed from Red’s computer to his. “Put the hurt on their capital ships and they might blink, draw fighters back to protect them.”
“Oh, I’m going to put a hurt on ‘em, all right.”
“My wing will stay with the Valkyries, try to draw them into a general melee,” Red was going on. “Kelly’s group will be in position to snag any who get through us.”
Tim’s eye flicked to the icons clustering above Fury behind them. He touched the globular where they were, caused a table to pop out and confirm the compliment of pilots and machines. She was there, taking command, already. He suppressed shiver of relief.
“That’s it. Nothing fancy.” Red paused. “Any questions?”
Tim frowned. “You’re asking me?”
A globular materialized to show Red’s face, sweat streaks across mahogany, shiny with blue hologram light. “I’ve got this feeling, Tim. This seems too obvious, set-up, like...I don’t know...rehearsed. They didn’t even try to hide their approach.”
Tim’s frown deepened and he stared at the tactical again. “Jeanie, boost long-range sensors. We getting anything out there?”
The hologram zoomed out as the machine worked. He waited a few seconds, watched the empty sprawl of the void between worlds and stars. All he saw was a mess of Valkyries coming right at them.
“Nothing, Tim,” the AI replied. “If there are any other ships in the vicinity, they’ve done a good job concealing their presence.”
He looked at Red’s globular. “You heard her.”
“Yeah,” she said, “I’m not picking up anything, either.” The leader of the Jesters gave herself a visible shake in the hologram. “No sense worrying, now, I suppose.” Her green eyes flared at him out of the image. “Good luck, Tim.”
He flashed his teeth at her in what would certainly look like a ridiculous smile. “Don’t need luck, lady; I make my own!”
An alarm blatted to indicate hostile targeting painting Tim’s Hellhound. It was joined by more, merging into a harsh racket as Jeanie painted halos around the closest Valkyries, showing they’d acquired their own long-range target locks on them. They were coming at them in plate formation, unusual for Alliance pilots, who typically preferred slim, arrowhead arrangements that enabled piercing or slashing attacks. The plate allowed one formation to bring all weapons to bear on a narrower one and then “shatter” after it struck, into individual squadrons or flights. It was inherently defensive.
Meant the Valkyries intended a dogfight—not to punch through to Fury.
Tim started to key Red’s channel to point it out, but the alarm warbled changed and the tactical filled with missile trails, roping out from every other Valkyrie. He opened his Wing Commander’s channel, instead. “Watkins Wing” he hated the squeak that’d risen in his voice “give ‘em one volley and it’s all speed after that. Punch through them!”
He didn’t wait for responses; flicked the weapons selector to missiles on the stick, keyed up the Number Four scatter-pack, and squeezed the trigger. The Hellhound chugged as the launcher emptied into the void. “You got targets for these, Jeanie?” he asked as the projectiles streaked off into the endless dark.
“Half a dozen picked out,” the AI replied almost cheerily.
And she did, the antimatter missiles spreading out and twining into the oncoming salvo of Valkyrie-launched warheads. An avalanche of Jester rockets tumbled past his fighter and raced to catch up to his fusillade, cluttering the tactical display with their dozens of tails that, in turn, were suddenly aped by the Alliance inbounds’ courses—all the little cyber-killers locking on one another in a frantic sprint for collision.
The tactical exploded all at once. Antimatter fire snowed across the void in a wave of eye-scouring white. Each holographic blossom was a tightly-controlled cataclysm. Merging into one, they were a holocaust fiery enough to lay waste to a small town on Fury’s surface.
And Tim was going right into it.
“Jeanie, all power to forward shields and thrusters,” Tim grated as, suddenly, the fire was all around him. “Give me everything this bucket’s got!”
She already was, the Hellhound thrumming with frantic acceleration around him. With his knifepoint focus, Tim hadn’t noticed the gray creeping into the edges of his vision, the sluggishness of his limbs, the labor of his breathing as g-forces outstripped even the Hellhound’s inertial compensators. But it began to crush him back into the flight couch now as Jeanie complied with his command and loosened the failsafe on the starfighter’s grav drive tolerances.
The maelstrom of antimatter blasts buffeted like a gust front on an open sea and the Hellhound jarred, shook. Then they were through.
But they weren’t out of the storm. An instant later, azure particle beams lanced out of the stars and carved into Tim and his onrushing wing mates. Valkyries silhouettes were visible for a terrible, tearing moment, spouting fire. One slashed by to port so close Tim’s Hellhound jolted with the near-impact. Shields sparkled and an alarm screeched. But Tim’s attention had already gone to a strobe of thermonuclear death to aft, where someone vanished in a millisecond of flaming violence.
And then they were through—really through, this time—with space opening out ahead of them and the convulsion of a mass dogfight left behind.
“Keep going!” Tim hollered to his wing.
On the tactical, the cluster of icons representing the carrier group drew near. At the crazy speeds they’d put on, they’d reach them in less than two minutes. To aft, space boiled with energy blades and slag. Not one Valkyrie had peeled off to give chase as Tim’s group shot through.
But a small host of fresh icons was pulling away from the capital ships to cut them off, just ahead.
“Jeanie, we’re going to overshoot the big guys at this rate! Decelerate to attack speed and reroute power to weapons.”
A pause and a flutter of sound like a voice distorting behind static. A flicker passed over some of the holograms. Tim’s stomach fell into a pit, then, as a familiar, androgynous tone filled the speakers. “Logic core compromised.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?!?!?”
“Restart recommended.”
Tim punched the instrument panel so hard the holograms blinked out for a moment. He struck it again with a shriek of rage. “Now?” Knuckles slammed something that crumpled. “You do this now?”
“Backup persona enabled,” the AI droned. “Manual contro—”
The crack of Tim’s fist off the control swallowed the rest of its recitation. Shaking his punished hand and blinking through sudden, cold sweat in the eyes, he raised the wrist comm to eye level. “Jeanie, are you in there?”
