A Galaxy Unknown 10: Azula Carver (31 page)

"I'm not seeing any signs of life, sir," the tac officer said, "although the Denubbewa don't emit much in the way of heat signatures."

"Then who attacked our shuttle?"

"It might have been a sort of self-defense mechanism," Gates said. "Any ship trying to enter the mothership without giving a certain recognition signal might come under fire from an automated laser cannon."

"Well, if that's the case, we certainly can't send any more shuttles in."

"What about sending one of the SDBs, sir? The shuttle was just Tritanium, but the SDBs are Dakinium-sheathed. Laser energy would simply be absorbed. And if they fired something stronger, it would just bounce off."

"Unless they fired some of those small nuclear-tipped missiles. Don't forget the
Salado
and
Yenisei
."

"Do you think they'd risk using those missiles inside their own mothership?"

"It would seem unlikely, but who knows?"

"The only other choice seems to be to destroy it so they can't ever use it, but we risk losing an awful lot of valuable intel."

"Com, set up a three-way between the
Koshi
, the
Pechora
, and us," Gavin said.

"Aye, sir, ten seconds."

Eight seconds later the images of Ellison and Eliza appeared on the main monitor.

"We just lost the shuttle sent over to that damned mothership," Gavin said. "All aboard were apparently killed when the ship was cut in half along the longitudinal axis. We can't send another Tritanium-hulled ship in there."

"So you want a Dakinium-sheathed ship, sir?" Eliza said. "I volunteer the
Pechora
."

"This has to be a volunteer effort all the way, Commander, since we are in no danger if we don't venture in. Inform your crew of the risks. Any who don't wish to enter the mothership can transfer to the
Koshi
. Contact me after any who wish not to go have transferred off your ship. Gavin out."

Fifteen minutes later, the
Ares
received a call from the
Pechora
.

"I made an announcement sir and instructed anyone who wished to transfer to the
Koshi
before we enter the mothership to immediately report to the shuttle bay. No one has entered the shuttle bay since the announcement."

"Very well, Commander. Proceed at your own pace."

"Yes, sir.
Pechora
out."

Gavin leaned back in his command chair and stared at the monitor. It was still showing an image of the mothership's entrance at maximum magnification. Suddenly, the image blacked out completely.

"Tac, reduce magnification slightly."

An instant later it was just possible to make out the shape of a black SDB against the star field as it entered the cavernous opening. As it reached a point where the shuttle had been destroyed, a laser beam shot out from the sidewall of the mothership and struck the SDB hull along the center line. The beam didn't have the slightest effect on the Dakinium, and the SDB continued to glide silently into the mothership.

"We're in, sir," Eliza reported. "I always thought the interior of Stewart SCB was large. That entire asteroid would get lost in here. This interior is easily four times as large. The center area appears to be devoted to docks for ship parking, while the outer walls seems to be housing, administration, engineering— or whatever."

"Any signs of life, Commander?"

"None, sir. No Denubbewa warships either."

"Since all of your crewmembers are volunteers, have a couple of dozen engineers suit up in EVA gear, divide into teams of six, and do a little recon. You have Marines, right?"

"Just two squads, sir."

"Send half a squad of Marines with each team as a protection detail."

"Of course, sir.?"

"Have your Marines be on the lookout for intruder prevention weapons like that laser cannon at the port entrance, and booby traps."

"Yes, sir"

"Have your tac officer retransmit all helmet cam images to the
Ares
."

"Of course, sir. Anything else?"

"That's all for now, Commander.
Ares
out."

Eliza set up the teams and briefed them, then watched as they left. She would have preferred to lead them, but she was in command now and had to remain with the ship.

Rather than docking, the SDB was floating close to an airlock. The teams moved out and entered the airlock in pairs because it only accommodated two people at a time. Once everyone was inside, the teams separated. Eliza sat in the command chair and watched the helmet cam images on the front monitor.

When Eliza was young, or rather when Jenetta was young, she had watched sci-fi shows where every alien ship seemed to be an organic entity with gooey, dripping walls and equally strange, gooey aliens, or completely impractical crystalline structures such as those that resembled delicate snowflakes. But since she'd joined Space Command, all of the ships she had encountered from all nations and alien life forms seemed rather conventional. Oh sure, the aliens came in every size, shape, and color, and were different on almost every planet, but the ships all seemed fairly conventional. The Denubbewa mothership was no different. She didn't understand the purpose of most of the consoles she saw, but from a materials and construction standpoint, they weren't all that different from Space Command ships. It seemed that practicality won out over abstruse impracticability every time.

The teams stayed aboard the mothership for several hours, and the engineers never entered a place that hadn't first been cleared by the Marines. No intruder-prevention weapons or booby traps had been discovered anywhere. By the time the teams were ordered to return to the
Pechora
, everything had started to look the same. They still didn't have a clue what most of it did, and it could take years to learn that.

After recovering all her crewmembers, Eliza spoke to Captain Gavin from her office while he was in his office. Commander Gates was with the captain.

"Everything went smoothly, sir, as you saw from the helmet cams. There didn't appear to be any Denubbewa aboard. No one has a clue what the various control consoles do or what the labs were to be used for."

"I understand. We were at a loss to explain their functions as well."

"The only option would seem to be that we drag one of these things back to Quesann for study."

"We have to make sure we're not dragging a Trojan horse before we do that," Gavin said.

"How about if we drag it to the Crondezzo system? At just twenty light-years, it would be close enough to Quesann for a modestly easy commute but not put Quesann in any immediate danger. We could rig the mothership with a couple of WOLaR bombs in case it suddenly came alive and developed a mind of its own. We should also drag those other keels back to the Lorense system foundry to take advantage of the materials and salvage the cargo containers for the freight companies they belong to."

"We'd need a whole fleet of tugs for that."

"The CPS-14s used to recover the space docks and hulls from the Uthlaro's latest effort to rebuild their military fleet should be available."

"I'll contact Quesann and see what they think."

"What should we do now, sir? Return to the
Ares
?"

"For now, remain inside that behemoth. Keep a sharp lookout for any signs of life. Perhaps some Denubbewa are hiding and just waiting for us to leave."

"Aye, sir. We'll remain in place and monitor the mothership interior for any signs of life until we hear from you."

~     ~     ~

"We've heard from the
Ares
," Admiral Moore announced at the regular meeting of the AB. "Captain Gavin requests that we send as many CPS-14s as possible to his location. He wants to drag the partially completed Denubbewa motherships to the Crondezzo system so our engineers and scientists can examine them. He also suggests bringing the open hulls to the Lorense system to recycle the materials."

"I'll second that if it's a motion," Admiral Woo said. "The ones Admiral Carver destroyed in her campaign were a mess, and most of the systems were just piles of electronics. We didn't learn very much from them. But intact motherships are a different matter entirely."

"Why the Crondezzo system?" Admiral Burke asked. "There's nothing there."

"That's the whole point. If the motherships are rigged to explode or to respond to remote control and suddenly come to life, the damage would be minimized. He also suggests planting WOLaR weapons inside the hull as a precaution so the ships can be remotely destroyed if they should suddenly come to life."

"That sounds like a sensible precaution," Admiral Hillaire said. "I'll support his proposal."

"All in favor?" Admiral Moore said. Looking around the table at the show of hands, he said, "Let the record show that the Board is unanimously in favor of bringing the three Denubbewa motherships to the Crondezzo system for close inspection and disassembly by our engineers and scientists, and bringing the open hulls to the Lorense system to be used as ship construction material.

"In other new business, I received a vidMail from Admiral Carver overnight. She is now the mother of two healthy babies. One, a girl, has been named Kaycee Annette Carver, and the other, a boy, is Kyle James Carver."

"Then she's not married?" Admiral Plimley said.

"She and soon-to-be Captain Hugh Michaels were married in February. Jen says Hugh insisted the babies have the Carver last name rather than Michaels because of its importance among the nobility on Obotymot and Nordakia.

"She also had a recommendation for the Board. She suggests that instead of requiring two SDBs for every bombing run with the Denubbewa, we could use CPS-14s as the lead ship to provide the telemetry timing data. That way, we could double the search capability of our current fleet of SDBs. If we mounted a CPS-14 collar on the SDBs, like the SDB collar on the battleships, each SDB could have their own CPS-14 with them when it's needed. The battleships can carry a CPS-14 in their shuttle bays to work with their SDB."

"Why not just have the SDBs carry the CPS-14s in their shuttle bay?" Admiral Bradlee asked.

"Admiral Carver says the shuttle bay on the SDB is too small to house a CPS-14."

"The cost of a CPS-14, which is basically a large tug, is miniscule compared to the cost of an SDB," Admiral Ahmed said. "If the
Ares
had had a CPS-14 with it that had been telemetry-paired with its SDB, they would have gotten that first Denubbewa mothership. I'll second the motion."

"There's no motion on the table yet," Admiral Moore said.

"Then I make a motion that we pair a CPS-14 with every SDB as the lead ship in bombing runs."

"I second the motion," Admiral Bradlee said.

"All in favor?" Admiral Moore said. After glancing around the table, he added, "The motion carries unanimously."

"Why didn't we think of that before?" Admiral Hillarie said. "It's so logical."

"That's why we need Admiral Carver back on active duty in Space Command," Admiral Yuthkotl said. "She never has a problem seeing the forest for the trees."

~     ~     ~

"
Pechora
, this is the
Ares
. A Denubbewa mothership just appeared on one of the Distant DeTect sensor buoys we put out. The
Ares
and
Koshi
are sounding GQ. The mothership will be here in less than ten minutes."

It was 0352 and the young lieutenant(jg) who was normally a helmsman had the third watch command. He immediately called Eliza's quarters and relayed the information.

"What should I do, Commander?" Lt. Dressa asked nervously.

"First, calm down. What are Captain Gavin's orders?"

"He hasn't transmitted any."

"He must also have been asleep at this hour. Well, he'll tell us as soon as he gets to the bridge. In the meantime, begin building our double envelope. I'll be on the bridge in a few minutes."

By the time Eliza got to the bridge three minutes later, the envelope had been built. Dressa yielded the command chair to Eliza, and she sat down to await the call from Gavin. Dressa moved to the helmsman chair.

"
Pechora
, this is Gavin. What's your status?"

"We have built our envelope and are awaiting instructions, sir."

"Excellent. We and the
Koshi
are underway for the rendezvous point. Join us there so the
Pechora
and the
Koshi
can link up for a bombing run."

"Aye, Captain. We'll be there straight away."

"
Ares
out."

"Helm," Eliza said, "take us to the RP."

"Uh, I'll have to drop the envelope so we can maneuver through the tunnel."

"Negative. We can't drop the envelope because it would take us two minutes to rebuild it. Calm down and think, Dressa. Because we have our Transverse Wave double envelope built, we're out of phase. We'll just pass through whatever solid matter we encounter, including this mothership's hull. So just take us directly from here to the RP."

It was Dressa's first time in a bridge command combat situation, so Eliza understood and wouldn't hold it against him as long as he managed to get his nervousness under control.

With a slightly embarrassed expression, Dressa said, "Engaging."

A second later the
Pechora
was so far from the mothership that it would have been just a distant speck if a rearward image had been up on the monitor.

?

When the
Pechora
arrived at the original RP location, the
Ares
and the
Koshi
were standing by. Gavin had the com chief establish a three-way between the ships. Each command officer saw the other two commanding officers on their front monitor.

"We'll wait to see what the Denubbewa mothership does," Gavin said. "Our sensor buoys are giving us a clear image of the Denubbewa shipyard. Link up and prepare for a bombing run. Then move the ship-to-ship contact screen to your armchair monitors and standby."

The
Pechora
and
Koshi
moved into position for the attack run. The
Pechora
would lead the assault, acting as the targeting ship and transmitting the timing information to the
Koshi
, which would actually lay the bombs inside the mothership. In previous engagements when attacking a mothership, three WOLaR bombs had been dropped. Three bombs, even WOLaR bombs, had proven inadequate to incapacitate the motherships, so they would now drop five on each pass. Both the
Pechora
and the
Koshi
had one hundred WOLaR bombs loaded in their tubes, but the
Pechora
would only switch places with the
Koshi
and drop bombs if the
Koshi's
bombs were not completely successful and the
Koshi
exhausted its load. They would keep attacking until either the Mothership was destroyed or they both ran out of bombs.