Battleship Destroyer (98 page)

Jack watched the
crowded boat bay as refugees started coming off the transports. "Godstar, where are we going to put them?" Jack shook his head in wonder. The rescue pod was approaching the rapidly drifting alien. Well clear of any protection from the hulks.

"Torpedoes' inbound Captain!  5 seconds."

"Point defense weapons shoot, all decoys fire." Jack practically screamed without thinking. "Where the hell did those come from? Well, we can't run and hide with our rescue pod hanging out in the open.

The 5 inch guns started flashing beams at the incoming torpedoes followed a second later by the 3 inch quads. The dozen anti-missile launchers puffed sending missiles streaking toward the incoming torpedoes. 

"The 5inch took out one at long range.
I knew they could do it and there goes one by the 3's." The 30mms started in as the torpedoes crossed 3 seconds out.

Jack watched the enemy's giant torpedo after torpedo die in the last 2 seconds suddenly realizing that as big as the enemy's torpedoes were, it would only take one to finish them off. Especially with their ass pointing at the enemy firing their own big guns and waiting to blast out of there.

A torpedo hit the shield deck of Echo as the last torpedo heading for the ship exploded less than a mile from them.

"Guns firing Captain, 3,
2. Shoot." Another 6 beams streaked away.

"20 seconds to recharge Captain. 35 seconds tell enemy's next gun salvo."

"Captain Turner, I am ordering you to leave before that next enemy salvo."

Pan turned toward Jack, her face
seemed pale as her lips seemed to tremble slightly. "Captain Turner why do you risk the lives of everyone aboard your ship for a single Waroble that does not deserve to live?"

Jack turned and
stared at the alien realizing why it was so important that he taught the alien what Humans were all about.  "You of all the Aliens have better come to realize one little frigging fact. Especially after all the death and misery you and your people have been through." Letting that sink in for several seconds. Holding up his hand when Pan opened her mouth to speak. Shaking his head he finally said. "Every life is just as important as everyone else's and one little mistake does not make someone worthless."

"Firing main guns in 3,
2, Shoot!" 6 beams streaked away from the ship."

"15 seconds to enemy salvo Captain."

Jack kept gazing into Pan's eyes. "If you insist on blaming someone for the Waroble making a mistake, blame yourself. Fact is, the next time you want to throw someone overboard for no reason. Throw yourself over board first."

"10 seconds to enemy salvo
Captain."

"
Spook, flash bombs at Charley's location." Jack said without taking his eyes off of Pan. "Now instead of worrying about killing someone that does not deserve killing: why don't you quit standing around here showing me how stupid you are while making yet another mistake and get me some weapons that we can use against these pricks or making sure your people don’t get flattened dead when we leave here simply because you screwed up and did not get every single one of them a tested acceleration couch or a hundred other things your people need."

"Five seconds to enemy gun salvo Captain. Shouldn't we get under cover?"
Six flash bombs exploded where the Hulk Charly had exploded in a fusion fireball only minutes before.

"Spook, full spread of decoys
now." Jack watched the Pod scoop up the alien worker Pan had called a Waroble and headed back toward the ship. Tactical how are we doing with our guns?

"The spiders have not even tried to dodge Captain. Every beam we have fired at them over the last two minutes has hit Target Alpha and Bravo sir. No signs of damage so far Captain."

Only some 20 beams streaked past with most of them streaking through the radiation cloud that was all that was left of hulk Charley. None came close to the ship.

"Captain, target Bravo has changed
course off to the lee side increasing his velocity at 200 gees around the cloud instead of slowing down. Ah, changing course again sir. I think we severely damaged its engines Captain. Slowing again to 150 Gees sir."

"Captain, Main guns, target Alpha firing in 3
, 2, shoot." Six beams streaked away again.

Turning away from Pan he looked at the pod streaking back toward the ship. "Weapons looks like you will have one more shot and then we are out of here. Target its engines just for the hell of it."

The guns fired again as the pod approached the boat bay without really slowing down. Not bothering to head for the Pod hatch to save time. Realizing he had the room to slide to a stop down between the rows of gigs.

"Captain, 10 seconds to Pod boarding. 15 to charge the main guns and 17 seconds to next enemy salvo."

"Very well lieutenant we mint as well as take one last shot. Weapons you have one more shot. Mr. Wilson be ready on the engines." Taping the comm. "Boat bay control. We will be doing 400 Gees 7 seconds after the Pod lands and a 1,000 shortly after that. Be ready."

Jack turned to Pan who was plaster white
, with sweat beading across her face and down her bare chest. She turned as Jack looked at her. Her eyes catching his as Jack realized that she was more scared than he was. Jack smiled at her. "Don't worry Pan. We will make it out of here with everyone."

Pan's eyes slowly returned to normal as what Jack later realized was a smile came to her face and she took a deep breath
seeming to relax as she stared into Jack's eyes."

"Captain, Boat Bay, Pod aboard."

"Captain, firing in 3, 2, Shoot."

"Number One, 400 Gees
on plotted course to the cloud NOW. Get us out of here. Detonate shield torpedoes and deployed flash bombs. Deploy another full spread of decoys times 2 now. Initiate boat decoy course programs."

The Red Pepper dropped down at 400 Gees on one engine.

"All six beams hit the Command ship target Alpha in the ass Captain. Target Bravo has lost all power and is tumbling." The Weapons officer punched the air over his head. "Damn! Target Alpha the Command ship is dead and starting to tumble as well sir. The other squadron ships are slowing down staying with the Command ship sir."

The other engine suddenly came on line thrusting the ship forward for a few seconds with the Gees building rapidly up to 500 before the first engine started dropping its power back to compensate.

Turning to the Admiral still on the little side screen as the hulks quickly disappeared behind them amongst a continues string of explosions scattered through the hulks and a fleet of what looked like Republic ships streaked out toward the nearest basses and star systems. "Bye Admiral, we are going to silent running stealth. My torpedoes and gun fire seem to have slowed the majority of the attack squadron hopefully enough for the slow squadron to disappear. It is time for me to get my own butt out as well. I am heading for the cloud and entry point X-ray 13 to pilot station 1331. It would be nice if you could arrange an escort." Jack hit the cut switch as he turned to the tactical screen showing the enemy fleet. "Comm cut all transmissions. Engineering, cut all external radiation and heat emitters. Tune engines for stealth." He had said that last out of habit with the old Mass acceleration Engines needing to be tuned into a narrow beam to be anything close to being stealthy and realized there was not much you could do to the new engines to make them more stealthy than they already were once the stream of decoy reaction mass was stopped being pumped into their exhaust. But it had not hurt.

Punching the
ship wide comm. "Captain Turner to crew. We are going to silent running. Shut down all emitters and none essential equipment." Jack started to punch the comm off but stopped and smiled. "Just thought you would like to know that we have managed to kill two enemy ships with our salvos of torpedoes and guns, hopefully saving our squadron of damaged ships slowing to enter the cloud. The Command Battleship we have been launching torpedoes at for a half hour to set up a trap is dead in space and dropping toward the cloud to be destroyed in about 50 minutes if it maintains its predicted course while another enemy ship should hit the cloud a few minutes before that. It looks like the rest of that squadron is hanging around the tumbling Battleship... And just to kill the roomers, Ensign Steward and his crew on the Admirals barge have received a lethal dose of radiation from one of the hulk's fusion core exploding a few minutes before we left but will survive long enough to complete their mission to lure the second enemy fleet into a fusion power core trap and act as a decoy while we escape. Hopefully. May God be with him and his crew. The barges crew list will be posted soon.  We are not off the planet in orbit yet but if everyone does their job as well as I know they can, we will make it and get what we have learned back to the Rock and Earth. God help us and our souls if he or she sees fit to do so. That is all." Jack killed the comm. He knew that Commanders had been sacrificing rear guards to allow troops and ships to retreat from hopeless situations since time began. It still did not make it any easier.

The Admiral's Barge had
already started making enough noise to wake the dead behind them.

Jack just wished he did not feel so much like a low life creeton for leaving him
and his crew to their deaths even though the Admiral had ordered it. The fact that he had been ignoring the Admiral's orders all day was nagging at the back of his mind. He was just hoping that everyone aboard the ship including him would not wind up following the crew of the Barge to the Promised Land. He did not hold much hope for their own chances even with the barge as a decoy.

All
he could do was to solder on. "Number One, you can cut thrust now. We have plenty of speed now. You can shut down the Engines as soon as you are ready and check the ship for radiation leaks. I want this ship to look like a rock."

"Captain, most of the lead enemy squadron survivors have stopped firing at the hulks and are powering away from the damaged Battleships. The second enemy fleet has stretched their arrival out for another 45 minutes as they probe the wreckage from what our passive scanners can tell.  The information transmitted from the Admirals barge shows they should arrive there in 8 or 9 hours." The Tactical Officer said starring at his screen.

Jack turned
to Pan. "Ok, how many thousands of refugees did we get? I suppose anything that could crawl came along."

Pan looked down at her tablet and started scratching.
"Not all slaves who survived the battle wanted to come. Many stayed with their ships believing that the Gods would come and rescue them when they strip the ships. Though most of the Ape slaves did come after watching your Red Apes successfully defend you to become honorable again." Pan bowed.  "They are now sworn Red Apes and they have done you the Honor of painting their armor Red marking them as yours if you will have them. With no boarding threat waking the Apes on the ship's ape storage decks. The Slave Apes were able to access the heavy weapons decks and brought you as many examples of the heavy weapons as they could get their hands on." Glancing down at her screen again. "Only another 3,412 slaves on all the boats Captain Turner with another 310 Red Apes."

"Captain,
one of my marine platoons has found something interesting on the Assault boat that crashed into the side of the ship with the black Apes."

Jack turned to the
screen showing the wrecked boat clinging to the side of the ship between two of the big guns taken off the enemy Battleship. The small roughly hundred foot long by twenty foot wide Assault boat did not have one single section of its hull that was not pierced or blasted leaving frames exposed and protruding. He could see marines moving inside through the many gaps. An open tank hatch was in the hull not far from the hulk with the hatch lights flooding out across it. After waiting a few seconds for the marine Commander to continue. "Yes Commander. What is it?"

"You
should come up here and see for yourself Captain." The Commander shook his head. "You won't believe it otherwise and you need to make a decision. Deck 43, tank C is the closest hatch to the boat sir. The Apes have set up an air curtain in the tank's hull hatch."

Jack started to count to 10 as he turned to the plot screen showing the ship had a good hour before they needed to pull up from hitting the cloud. Shaking his head. "I will be right up."

Turning to Pan. Looking at the masses of refugees packing the ship on the screens lining the back bulkhead behind the damage control and security consoles. "We are getting ready to do some extreme maneuvering and acceleration in just about an hour. During that acceleration, everyone will be required to be laying in acceleration beds or chairs just in case the grav-coils can't keep up. We have a few extra but with all the bow damage we do not have even close to enough for everyone if our bunks and couches would even fit some of your people. Do your people have any idea what they can use to protect themselves if our grav coils can't keep up when the ship does maximum Gees acceleration and the decks gravity jumps to 10 or 20 +or even 100 Gees above normal briefly?" Looking at Pan with a pained expression. "An hour is not much time to do much of anything before we have to start maneuvering but that is all I can give you to prepare. You are also going to have to reinforce the anchors on your Assault boats attached to the hull."