The last war 1 3, p.38
The Last War 1-3, page 38
The marines started a grim march toward their enemies, boots thumping on the deck in sync.
“Ready?” said Mattis. “On three. One, two—”
“Don’t get shot again,” said Lynch to Modi, grinning maniacally.
“Three!”
The three of them bolted out of the airlock, running down the corridor and toward the fork. Modi went right, toward Engineering, while Lynch and Mattis went left. When they were clear, heavy, stomping boots walked down the corridor toward the pilot’s ready room, punctuated by the sounds of automatic gunfire.
“Remind me to give the Rhinos a raise,” he said, “but only if they promise to stop singing. None of them can carry a tune worth crap.”
“I think,” said Lynch, “that’s part of their thing. Singing, being thick skinned, horny—you know. It’s their motto.”
“What’s the motto?” asked Mattis.
“Nothing, whats-a-motto with you?” Lynch grinned like an idiot. His head injury may have been more serious than they thought.
“I should have left you in the airlock.” Mattis pinched the tip of his nose. “Let’s get to the bridge before I kill you. Or myself. I dunno, I was just going to play it by ear, but there was going to be a lot of killing.” The gunfire receded down the corridor as the Rhinos advanced. “Maybe we don’t need those armored goons after all, we’ll just flush out the boarders with your dad-jokes.”
“Aye aye,” said Lynch, strolling down the corridor toward the bridge. “I’ll make my way to the intercom. I’ll think of a funny joke on the way. Very funny. Promise.”
Mattis fell into step with Lynch, flanked by a pair of marines who, mercifully, only wore the standard combat armor. How many of those Rhinos did they have on board, anyway? Couldn’t have been more than the three.
“Sir,” said a voice in his earpiece, barely audible through the static. “We have an issue.”
“Send it.”
“The boarders escaped the ready room lavatory,” he said, “they’re headed down corridor G11.”
G11—the one parallel to their own.
Straight to the bridge.
Chapter 37
Bridge
CNS Luyang III
High Orbit Above New London
Omid Sector
Admiral Yim definitely should have picked up a cup of coffee in New London. They were right there at his favorite coffee shop, why hadn’t he? The kid they had picked up, he was onboard now. Maybe they could get him to brew them up something. Yim’s mouth watered just thinking about that smooth, warm, caramel-y flavor—
The Luyang III shook slightly as a wave of incoming fire washed over the hull. No time to think about coffee.
“Status on the American satellites?” he asked.
“Their weapons are still powered down,” said Xiao. “But they appear to have launched combat drones.” He snorted dismissively. “Don’t know why they bothered. Our J-84’s have much greater acceleration. The maneuvers are a success; we’re able to hit and run before their weapons can get a lock.”
“Good,” said Yim. “Remember, those are drones: no pilots. No diplomatic incidents. Shoot them all down—no hesitation.”
Xiao smiled. “You got it, sir. Gun batteries are also engaging, and we’re spinning up the point defense cannons. Our pilots report that they’re enjoying their target practice very much.”
Drones were excellent at certain things, but they were predictable. The Chinese intelligence nerds had figured out through some arcane wizardry that the American space-combat drones had a fatal flaw in their target acquisition software. It was complicated and, not being a pilot, he couldn’t describe the exact natures of the maneuvers needed to confuse them, but his understanding was that by approaching the drones at high speed, engaging with guns, then retreating at a similarly high speed made them switch targets. Perform this maneuver with too many craft too quickly and the system became overwhelmed, constantly shifting between targets and never committing to any of them.
Risky, but apparently successful.
Their communications officer spoke up. “Sir,” said Ting. “We are receiving an incoming transmission, top priority.”
It was tempting to just ignore it—nobody would question the commander of a navy vessel not picking up the phone during a heated battle no matter who it was—but Yim knew better. “Put it through,” he said.
“Admiral Yim,” said a voice in his head. The sound came through a vibration in the side of his skull, an implant inside his skin that his ears translated into speech; a nifty piece of Chinese technology the Americans probably didn’t even realize he had. He recognized the voice instantly—General Lok Tsai. The Chief of Joint Staff for the entire military of the People’s Republic of China. The big wig. “How are you doing?”
Such a strange question. Yim smiled slightly, despite the complete impossibility that Tsai could see the gesture, and whispered his response as quietly as he could. “Blowing up billions of dollars of American property with absolutely no repercussions or political fallout? It’s just like old times, and I love it.” He leaned forward, putting his chin on top of his folded hands. “Just don’t ruin the moment and tell me I have to stop.”
“Well,” said General Tsai, “you know how these things are. Target the drones, the automated platforms, and the rebel ships, but don’t fire on the Americans whatever you do.”
The use of the word rebel—Pànnì in Chinese—was interesting. Yim knew they were some kind of disgruntled veterans or something, but of course Chinese intelligence would probably assume the worst and tell themselves that the Forgotten were full-blown rebels. They had always been paranoid about that kind of thing for themselves and their own colonies—probably because most of the Intelligence spent their time looking inward instead of outward. Projection was a real thing.
“Don’t worry, General,” whispered Yim. “I’ll try to keep collateral damage to the Americans to a minimum.” He glanced at his various monitors. The boarding ships were swarming Mattis’s ship. Little leeches attaching themselves but, instead of draining blood, injecting dark poison.
There wasn’t much he could do. Firing on them directly would be difficult—especially in light of his just-made promise—and inserting Chinese marines would just make things worse. A lot worse.
He and Mattis had gotten along well on the surface of New London, but the truth was, Yim had killed Mattis’s brother. It might have been decades past in a war long fought, but there was no way he was forgetting that fact any time soon.
“Okay,” said General Tsai. “Play nice with the Americans for now. but know that you may be called upon to defend the Motherland.”
Would he? They had almost—almost!—made some kind of breakthrough with the Americans. Almost had one whole incident where the two nations didn’t end up shooting at each other … and now it had come to this.
They would understand, of course. Yim had the American government’s full permission to break as much stuff as the Forgotten had taken, but, it seemed, his government would stymie any attempt at a lasting peace between the two.
“Of course,” whispered Yim, somewhat more angrily than he could reasonably conceal. “General, I must return to the battle.”
“Swift hunting, Admiral Yim,” said General Tsai, and closed the link.
What a bastard. Was he trying to cause war between the two nations?
Yim tried, unsuccessfully, to put the conversation with Tsai out of his head and focus on the battle. He couldn’t. It stuck in there like glue, taunting him with how close they had come to a bit of peace, a little bit of teamwork which, he hoped, they hadn’t almost immediately squandered.
On his various screens, he watched a breaching craft slip into the Midway’s hangar bay.
Damn thing was so small, it must have evaded notice somehow. How, exactly, he wasn’t sure—possibly a composite material that would absorb radar, possibly some other much more mundane solution—but it didn’t matter. That was a problem for the Americans.
“Luyang III to Midway,” said Yim, “I’m sure you’re aware you’ve got a parasite craft. Let me know if you want help dislodging it.”
No response, but that was normal given the circumstances.
“Sir,” said Xiao, “two—no, make that, three of the American satellites have been activated.”
Now things were starting to heat up. The defense satellites were similar in style to the Goalkeeper system defending Earth. But they had been powered down—who had flicked the switch? “Were they activated by the Midway?” he asked.
“No,” said Xiao, “by the Forgotten. They’re preparing to fire on us.”
Chapter 38
Corridor G10
USS Midway
High Orbit Above New London
Omid Sector
“Okay,” said Mattis, holding his pistol in both hands as he, Lynch, and two marines power-walked down the corridor. “The intruders are traveling down corridor G11. That’s parallel left of our position. Both of these corridors lead toward the bridge, but halfway to the bridge they join up and run side by side, divided only by a line of paint on the floor. Then the corridor turns inward to the core of the ship, to the bridge.”
“Right,” said Lynch. “If they reach that choke point first, they can cut us off.”
“Actually,” said Mattis, unable to fight back a wide smile. “If we wait there, we can plug them in the back as they move past. They have to. It’ll give us the element of surprise.”
“It’s a bad plan,” said one of the marines, furrowing his brow. “Trained marines will watch all corners. They probably even know where we are, and they might be getting ready to do the same thing to us.”
He hadn’t considered that. Once again he was reminded to leave the soldiering to the soldiers. “Good point. Let’s just go faster.”
The four of them broke into a jog. To the right, they passed store room after store room, each holding various supplies. Food. Medical. A water tank.
“Wish we had some of those Rhinos,” said Lynch.
“No you don’t, Commander,” said the marine, jogging down the corridor, his rifle raised. “They can’t move like this. Barely more than a walking pace. Plus, they’re real dumb, sir. It takes a special kind of person to want to crew something that’s designed to get shot at—much less enjoy it.”
Another good point. They passed a section of hull that was all wall. Up ahead, Mattis could see the intersection of the corridors where G10 and G11 met. “Well,” he said, “the mental stability of our elite counter-boarding units aside, we should be coming up on the fork now, and—” A cramp shot up his left leg and he stopped.
“Sir?” asked Lynch, moving up to him. The marines ahead stopped.
“It’s fine,” he said, gritting his teeth and rubbing his leg. “It’s just me being old, is all, one second and—”
A blast blew out the bulkhead to his right, fragments peppering the left side of the wall and chewing up the metal—right where they would have been standing if they hadn’t suddenly stopped. Old age had its benefits, he supposed. The blast knocked him off his feet, the sound of everything was swallowed by a profound ringing in his ears. Smoke poured out everywhere—purple smoke, as though from smoke grenades.
“Contact!” roared the marine, barely audible over the ringing. He fired down the corridor at something Mattis couldn’t see. “Dammit, they got here first!”
The Forgotten had moved fast. Real fast. Mattis had been slowed down by his age and a cramp in his leg that never would have happened when he was younger, but the Forgotten weren’t exactly spring chickens either; most of them were veterans of the same conflict, had the same grey hair he had. The same aches and pains.
It was the Battle of the Grandpas.
Mattis shook his head, trying to clear out the ringing. He pushed himself up onto his elbows. Everything felt lighter, as though the blast had damaged the artificial gravity. Or maybe that was just the damage to his ears.
“—gotta go!” shouted Lynch, right behind him. “The hull’s been breached! Those bastards blew out the emergency valves!”
The explosion hadn’t been directed toward them. It had been directed away out to the outer hull where a shaped charge had blasted a fist-sized gap in the metal. As his hearing came back, he could hear the howling of air as the corridor decompressed, the wailing of alarms, and the hissing of the emergency doors sliding down to seal off that section to keep the ship’s precious air in.
Adrenaline kicked him back onto his feet, along with some manhandling from Lynch. With the marines firing wildly the four of them sprinted down the corridor toward the rapidly descending airlock door. His cramp was forgotten.
Down, down, down came the door, dropping rapidly. Too rapidly. Gunfire was hissing all around him, bullets screaming off the walls, and the rushing air threatened to pull him off his feet.
Both marines darted through the door. Lynch ducked the descending wall of metal, but Mattis was taller. He slid forward like a batter sliding onto home base, barely missing having his head sliced off as the emergency bulkhead sealed itself ten centimeters away from his head.
“Jaysus H.,” said Lynch, his face white. “You love cutting things close, don’t you Jack?”
“Just enough is good enough,” said Mattis, panting softly, his bones aching. He hadn’t run like that in years. Pushing himself back up to his feet, Mattis looked through the thin window. On the other side, people wearing a mixture of civilian and military spacesuits from various services—Space Navy, Terrestrial Navy, Marines, Atmospheric Force, and even one from the Coast Guard—hurried toward the heavy steel decompression door with glowing oxy-torches that burned like angry little stars. Behind them, a team of five people carried heavy bits of some kind of machinery in both hands.
“Time to go,” said Mattis. “We gotta get to the bridge. They won’t be able to cut through the armored casemate there with anything people can carry by hand.”
“Right,” said Lynch, and the four of them started toward the bridge, jogging once more.
“Sir?” asked one of the marines, his helmet projecting a small image in front of his head. A view from one of the security cameras in the corridor they had just left. “The intruders. It looks like they’re constructing something.”
“What kind of something?” asked Mattis as the troupe rounded the last bend to the bridge. The huge steel wall that was the armored casemate of the bridge was half open, ready to be sealed at a moment’s notice. They were obviously expected.
“A laser drill,” said the marine. “I think.”
“Maybe they just want to give us a light show,” said Lynch.
Unlikely. But how the hell did veterans get their hands on this kind of equipment? It nagged at him, just like the SAM from the Chinese embassy. That kind of hardware you couldn’t just buy. It had to be supplied by a government. Yim’s people, maybe?
Or his own?
“Can that thing crack the casemate?” asked Mattis. Now was not the time for idle speculation.
“Probably,” said Lynch. “We’d have to ask Modi.”
The four of them slipped past the armored door and, with the groan of stressed metal, it slowly began to seal closed. Then, beyond, a simple door, just for neatness sake. They stepped through and onto the bridge.
“Officer on deck,” said someone. The two marines standing by the door came to attention.
“At ease,” said Mattis. “Close the casemate. Get the Rhinos in here to clean out the trash. Lynch?”
“Aye aye,” said Lynch, moving over to his station, clipping on an earpiece. “On it.”
Mattis let him do the work, settling into the captain’s chair. “Report.”
“Looks like the intruders are cutting through the first door,” said Lynch, who then touched his ear. “Modi! You awkward bastard, I need to ask you a favor. Can you look up the specs for mining lasers?” A brief pause. “No, I don’t know what damn type of laser! Hang on, I’ll send you a picture.”
Mattis couldn’t help but smile, despite the faint vibration in the deckplate that signaled some kind of powerful energy displacement. If they got through the armored shield, there would be a firefight on the bridge, something he definitely wanted to avoid.
“Suits on,” he said, reaching below the chair for the helmet and fragile emergency suit stowed there. “We might have company real soon.”
Chapter 39
Bridge
USS Midway
High Orbit Above New London
Omid Sector
The decompression door between corridor G11 and the bridge didn’t hold long. Mattis didn’t expect it to. It was tough and reinforced, yes, but it only designed to keep air in. In fact, to facilitate rescues, it was specifically engineered to be easily cut through.
However, the armored casemate was another story. It was designed to be utterly impregnable; under normal circumstances if there was a hole in the casemate then the ship had probably sustained so much damage that the whole thing was lost. It would hold for a time. Minutes, definitely. Hours, maybe.
Enough.
“Lynch,” said Mattis, shuffling and getting comfortable on his captain’s chair. “What does Modi say?”
“A bunch of jibber jabber. I swear the robot’s off his meds.” said Lynch, grumbling softly. “But mostly that the casemate is tougher than a bull’s hide. The Forgotten will not get through it for at least half an hour, assuming they’re using standard drilling lasers.”
“Something tells me we don’t have that kind of luck.” It was always foolish to assume one’s enemies would be operating at a disadvantage. Hope, yes. Expect, no. “Assuming the absolute best equipment and ideal conditions, how soon could they get through it if they really wanted to?”
Lynch relayed the question. “Five minutes,” he said. “Although it could be closer to eleven.”
That was a fairly large variance in potential capabilities. Mattis began clipping his suit on. Either way, no sense in not being prepared. “How far away are those Rhinos?”
