The silver fleet the com.., p.137
The Silver Fleet: The Complete Series, page 137
But LaCruz wasn’t listening, she was too busy scanning the room.
Markham was over to her left, kneeling down, still in his underwear, with the albino standing behind him holding a pulse rifle. It was when she realised that he was also wearing a respirator that she started to piece together what might have happened.
The Peter the Great crew had clearly planned this in advance. They’d waited until most of the Marines were asleep before tampering with the oxygen feed coming into the cargo bay. The sentries probably hadn’t even realised what was going on. That was one of the things with being deprived of oxygen, it tended to leave you feeling disoriented.
It also meant that the sleepers on the ground would be less likely to wake up when the raiders moved amongst them trying to locate their targets.
Because, of course, they’d had a comprehensive list of who was who.
Ferguson had given it to them.
There was a group of scientists in the middle of the room who were only now managing to rouse themselves. Like Markham, they were still in their underwear and were being watched over by two guys in respirators she hadn’t seen before.
Now, that was worrying.
Where had these guys come from?
They must have come in on another shuttle. Which meant that someone had given them access. Which either meant that the Peter the Great crew had complete control of the ship or someone on the Motar had been helping them.
Could it be that Kapinsky kid? She knew he was young but surely, he had a better grasp of operational security than that?
LaCruz slowly got to her feet. If they were going to make a move, now would be a good time. But from the way her captor stepped back to cover her, he was obviously thinking the same thing.
“Heay, sarge! You alright?” she called.
“Thick head but, other than that, I’m fine. How ‘bout you.”
“Oh, you know, I’ll be alright once I’ve had my morning juice. Say, what was with all the shooting?”
Before he could answer, the albino stepped forward and kicked him between the shoulder blades, driving Markham to the floor.
“Our timings here are pretty tight,” the albino said, pulling his mask down around his neck. “So I’d appreciate it if we could keep things moving.” At that moment, the guy with the broken nose drove his rifle stock straight at her stomach. He’d assumed that she’d been distracted by Markham’s plight, but all the time she’d been watching him out of the corner of her eye.
LaCruz spun around, catching the rifle with her knee and knocking it to one side. At the same time, she was bringing up her elbow and drove it into the side of his neck. The impact staggered him though not enough for him to drop the rifle.
Instead, she stepped inside his guard and proceeded to rip the respirator off his face. The natural response when that happens is for the person to throw up a hand in an attempt to save the respirator and that’s just what he did, leaving himself open all down his right-hand side.
The guy was that much taller than her, so she had to rise up on her tiptoes in order to bring her knee high enough to target his ribs.
She felt something give as she drove her knee home using the full power of her hips causing the man’s right leg to give way. He crashed forward onto his hands and knees, trapping the rifle under him. So then, rather than try to wrestle it off him, LaCruz simply wrapped her arms round his neck and started to squeeze.
“Not nice when someone cuts off your oxygen supply, now, is it?” she whispered.
But the guy still wasn’t finished and he tried to plant his foot on the floor with a view to launching himself back onto his feet.
Only, this wasn’t LaCruz’s first rodeo.
She simply stepped away from him, while still maintaining her choke hold, effectively pulling him off balance. It was a position which granted her all the advantages.
She could probably keep that up all day long.
But before she got the opportunity, a shot zinged past her head. She glanced across to see the albino lining her up for his next shot.
“Okay, you’ve made your point. Let him go.”
“What? So you can take my head off?”
The albino lowered the pulse rifle before swinging it round in a lazy arc. When it came to rest, it was angled in Markham’s general direction.
“I won’t ask again.”
LaCruz gave one last squeeze and then released both arms. Without her support, the raider fell backwards onto the deck plates.
If the albino was going to shoot her, now would be as good a time as any.
But he didn’t. Just kept his gun levelled at her while her guy managed to stagger to his feet.
She looked over at Markham who gave her an exasperated look and then shrugged his shoulders. No doubt, he’d have done things differently.
Only he wasn’t a woman in a man’s world. She needed to send these guys a clear message: if they intended to come for her, they’d better bring their A-game.
*
They’d gone over the data countless times and, as far as Katherine Schwartz was concerned, they had no alternative.
“We have to divert. We have to change course now, while we still can,” she looked to McNeill. “How long left?”
McNeill winced. “It’s difficult to say exactly. The Loki has initiated three boosts in the last fifteen minutes. Each time we’ve been forced to re-calculate. From scratch. It’s all part of their plan to keep us guessing. Cut down our options. If you ask me, the safest thing would be to break off now. We’d minimise the damage that way.”
Faulkner, who was leaning against the workstation, shook his head.
“If we break off now there’s no guarantee that we’ll be able to pick them up on the other side. It’s too risky.”
McNeill had his face buried in his hands and when Faulkner looked over to Schwartz she just shrugged. A long thirty seconds passed before McNeill finally looked up.
“Sir. The way I see it we’ve got about thirty minutes to make up our mind. After that, we’re past the point of no return and hand the initiative over to them. If we do nothing, we’ll continue on into the middle of this debris cloud with all that that implies. Crash, bang, wallop! Meanwhile, the Loki gets away without so much as a scratch. Even if we were able to survive this, the ship would be so badly damaged that we’d be in no position to give chase.”
Faulkner was standing over a separate console, watching the various scenarios they’d mocked up run through, trying to make sense of them. In each one, the Renheim suffered catastrophic damage to most if not all of her main systems. In a number of cases, the ship was completely destroyed.
Schwartz moved to stand behind him. When she spoke, her voice was so soft that the others had to strain to hear her.
“I realise that it looks bad, sir, but if we’ve called it early enough and - thanks to Fin here - I think we have, then we do have a viable alternative.”
“And that is?” Faulkner said, his voice sounding hollow.
“We re-set our course. The Navigation team are working on it now. We find our way around this thing and, in so doing, we manage to avoid the worst of it. With any luck, we’ll come through this with a little damage to our paintwork.”
Faulkner didn’t say anything straightaway. Instead, he simply looked up at the main screen where their forward cameras were showing the live feed of the fleeing enemy. The magnification was such that the Loki appeared to be more or less within striking distance.
“How soon before she comes within weapons range,” he asked.
“Another forty minutes at least,” Schwartz said. “I’m sorry, sir. We had no way of knowing it was going to be this tight.”
“And yet the Da’al managed to work it out.”
He said it as a flat statement but there was no denying the overall sense of disappointment. They’d allowed themselves to be out-maneuvered.
“Sir,” Schwartz said. “There was no way of anticipating this. It’s a totally unique situation.”
“That’s right and like any other unique situation where there is adversity there must also be opportunity. All we have to do is to work out where that opportunity lies.”
She looked at him in disbelief. No doubt wondering whether he was suffering from some kind of relapse, a delayed reaction to his surgery perhaps.
Except, his mind had never been so clear.
“Sir, the clock is ticking,” Schwartz said.
“Which I’m well aware of, First Officer. Mr Leyton, could I have a word.”
Second Lieutenant Leyton was the principal helmsman who was about to go on duty. He was slim with fair hair and a face full of freckles. He had the air of an earnest, young insurance salesman.
“Mr Leyton,” Faulkner began. “What if we were to simply avoid this debris field altogether and just go around it? How would that affect our course in relation to the Loki?”
Leyton appeared to be at a loss for words and looked to Schwartz for support but she simply pointed him back to Faulkner.
“Sir, you’re right of course,” she said, choosing her words carefully. “A course change at this juncture would be highly significant,” he said, choosing his words carefully. “And it would put us at a marked disadvantage if we wanted to track down the Loki at a later date. But I don’t see what our alternatives are. If we press ahead then we risk the safety of the entire ship.”
Faulkner scanned the bridge, the majority of eyes were turned in their direction. It was clear that they’d reached a significant moment in their pursuit. What happened now would have serious consequences for all of them.
They all looked so anxious. Everyone that was, apart from McNeill who was standing on the back of his chair taking it all in. McNeill looked excited.
The rest were probably wondering whether he could be trusted. After all, wasn’t he the one who’d sacrificed the Mantis, along with all those crewmembers?
“How significant a disadvantage?” he asked, careful to avoid looking directly at Leyton. “Timewise, how far would this put us back?”
“Best case scenario?” Leyton said. “It’d be another twenty hours before we could hope to get anything meaningful from our long-range scans again. The backwash from the meteor cloud would see to that. It’d just scramble everything.”
“Twenty hours? That seems like an awfully long time,” he looked over to McNeill. “Would you agree with that?”
McNeill blew out his cheeks. “I’d imagine that would be a very conservative estimate, sir.”
“So, what do you think our chances would be of finding her again?”
McNeill looked to Leyton who just shrugged.
McNeill said, “If they stick to basically the same trajectory then we’ve got half a chance.”
“And if they’re clever and diverge from that path?”
“Then, chances are we’ll be left looking for a needle in a quantum haystack.”
“Just hoping to get lucky?” Faulkner said.
“Exactly, sir.”
Their little gathering fell silent for a moment as they considered their options.
It was Leyton who spoke first.
“Sir, if we’re to program in a new course then we’re going to have to do it in the next few minutes. Just so we’re clear.”
He didn’t wait for a reply but went over to relieve his colleague at the helm.
Faulkner indicated for Schwartz to walk with him over to McNeill’s station. When he spoke, his voice was barely above a whisper.
“We need to make a decision. Is there any way we can fly through this debris?”
McNeill furrowed his brow, “We could look at a trajectory that would hopefully allow us to avoid all the major fragments but that’d be less than ideal. We’re going to absorb an awful a lot of damage here no matter what we do. That’s unavoidable, I’m afraid.”
“Is there anything else we could do to improve our chances?”
“However strange it might sound,” Schwartz prompted.
“Well, if you’re looking for strange, I think I can help with that,” McNeill pulled at his jaw, deep in thought. “Look, I know that our evasion software is first rate but we’re going to encounter stuff in there that you just can’t program for. Not with the time we’ve got, anyway.”
“So, what?” Faulkner said. “You’re talking about a manual over-ride. Is that what you’re suggesting?”
“Yes, one man,” McNeill glanced at Schwartz. “Or woman, in complete control. We need to keep things simple.”
Faulkner lowered his voice even further. “Are we talking about Mr Leyton?”
McNeill gave him a disgruntled look. “Not unless we can teach him how to interpret all this data while effectively flying blind.”
“So, who then? Not you, surely?”
McNeill threw up his hands.
“All I’m saying is that my impact recognition software is highly effective but it’s not very intuitive. You’d have to know precisely what you were looking for.”
“While still being able to fly the ship accordingly,” Faulkner couldn’t keep the scepticism out of his voice.
McNeill said, “He’d have to be able to calculate zones of threat, velocity and possible evasion techniques on the spur of the moment. Plus, if we should commit to this, there’d be no turning back. It’s sink or swim.”
*
“How you doing?” Markham said.
They were kneeling in rows, their hands shackled behind their backs.
“I’ve been worse,” she said. The blood around her nose just starting to harden.
“Anything broken?”
“Not sure. Though it wasn’t for want of trying on their part.”
“You have a way of getting people’s attention.”
She smiled at that, though when she did, she found that her teeth hurt.
Markham looked around the cargo bay. The new guys were moving about, checking to ensure that they had everyone secured, particularly the Marines.
“How’d they get in?” LaCruz asked.
“Only one way they could have,” Markham inclined his head towards the air-tight compartment next door.
LaCruz turned to look only to catch the eye of the guy kneeling next to her. She recognised him as part of the construction team that had erected the scaffold around the ghost ship. The guy’s face was a mess. She imagined that the pair of them would make a lovely couple.
She immediately turned back to face the front. She didn’t want to draw any more attention to herself than she had to. She’d had enough of that for one day.
“You think it was an inside job,” she asked. “One of Ferguson’s people?”
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Markham replied. “I’m thinking that they didn’t search that first shuttle as thoroughly as they should have.”
“I see what you mean. Everybody was too taken up with that red head to follow proper procedure. You think they left someone on board? Is that how they did it?”
“Makes sense to me. Hid in a cupboard, maybe? Then waited ‘til nightfall. I’m not sure how he’d have over-ridden the safeties to get those outer doors open but anything’s possible if you know what you’re doing.”
LaCruz nodded sullenly. That’s what happened when you didn’t follow procedure. You missed things.
“But how did they get that second shuttle over here without anyone noticing?”
“Somebody would have noticed – they just chose to look the other way.”
“We’ve been set up.”
“Yeah!” Markham growled. “Looks that way.”
“What about our guys?” LaCruz asked. “We had sentries posted, right?”
“Crowne and Brigham. But I don’t see either of them around, do you?”
“No, sarge. I don’t.”
They fell silent as one of the women scientists was brought over. She must have been holed up somewhere hoping she’d be overlooked. One of the raiders from the Peter the Great crew stepped over and secured her hands behind her back before pushing her down onto her knees.
There seemed to be a lot of these new raiders from the other ship. So far, she’d counted sixteen of them.
“What about the Motar people?” LaCruz said, trying to calculate the odds. “You think we can still count on them?”
“Hard to tell. They’ve still got their weapons though I’m not sure how long that’s going to last. Saratova’s lot don’t seem the type who’ll play well with others.”
“What about Captain Noah? You think he’s a part of all this?”
“Guy’s completely out of his depth. I’ll be surprised if we see much of him again. In the meantime, we’re going to have to look out for ourselves.”
“You thinking of making a move?” the construction guy behind them suddenly piped up. “If you do, you can count me in.”
“Good to know,” Markham said. “What’s your name by the way?”
“Hegazi. But everyone calls me Heg.”
“Okay, Heg. Let’s not waste any time. First thing I need you to do is to contact your guys. See how many of them have got skills we can make use of. Firearms. Explosives. That kind of thing.”
“I’m on it.”
LaCruz turned to look at Markham.
“You got something planned?”
“We’re on a spaceship,” he explained. “The skin on these things are only a few inches thick in places. That makes them super vulnerable to attack – especially from the inside.”
CHAPTER SIX
“I don’t remember coming down this way,” Webster said, running a hand along the wall.
“That’s because we didn’t,” Dalbiri said. “All this is new.”
Webster was trying to work out how the corridor had been constructed, checking out the moulded ribs which curved overhead. They met in the middle to form a reinforced centre. It was bizarre, like being inside the nave of some medieval church.
“Sorry? New? How does that work?”
“New to me at least. Our scans had told us that these areas existed – we’d just never been able to get inside before now.”
“How does that work?” Webster said.
“I’m not sure,” Dalbiri moved further up the steeply raked surface. “Of course, now that I’m here, I don’t have any equipment to take my readings.”
