First Principles: Samair in Argos: Book 3 (4 page)

Those shields are failing.  One more pass and there won’t be any left, and then we can start stripping away the ship’s claws.

~~~~~~~~~~~*~~~~~~~~~~~~

              “This isn’t working,” Gants said to himself.  The fighters had been pecking away at his shields and there was little he could do about that.  As the words came out of his mouth, one of the turbolasers picked off another one of the boxy fighters and he nodded in satisfaction, but there were far too many of them left.  The corvette had limped off after the mauling his weapons had given to her but she was still fast enough to keep out of
Leytonstone
’s effective weapons envelope.  Even at her peak,
Leytonstone
was fast and maneuverable, but she was still a cruiser.  She could accelerate better than other large ships, but she couldn’t hope to do so as well as something as small as the company corvette, which meant that unless he could pin the corvette against something, he couldn’t engage the company warship unless they wanted to get into a scrap.

              “Helm, put us back on course for the mining station and engage at best speed.”

              “We’re still an hour away, Colonel,” the navigator reminded him as she entered in the new course.

              “I know,” he said.  “But these fighters are nibbling away at the shields and we’re barely doing anything to them.  We need to change the odds, force them to do something drastic.  Maybe if we put their real estate in danger, they’ll be more pliable.”

              “But, sir, what about the fighters?” the tactical officer asked.  “Individually, their fire isn’t that significant, but collectively, they can hurt us, especially with our shield strength so low.  And with us firing almost until the guns overheat, we can’t do anything to recharge the shields.”

              Gants nodded.  “Guns, cease fire.  Make sure the weapons retain charge and are ready to fire on my command, but cease trying to shoot down those ships for the moment.  Redirect power to recharging the shields.”

              “Aft shield generators are out, Captain,” the tactical officer reported.  “Damaged.  But I can get the rest of the shield coverage firmed up.”

              He nodded again.  “Good, do it.  If the fighters try to get at the engines, use the aft guns to try and keep them at bay.”

              Paxton pressed a few controls.  “We’ve only got four heavy laser cannons active in the after section, Colonel.  And so far they haven’t been great at shooting down those flyers.”

              “No, but it might keep them from coordinating any serious attack on the engines and right now that’s what we need.  If we can get in close enough to either the station or their freighters, we might be able to get them to behave and show us the proper respect.”

              “Status?” Tamara asked.  Her displays were showing the view of the ship. 

              “We’ve sealed off the damaged sections, ma’am,” Ykzann said, his voice sounding harried.  There was a slight buzz in his voice.  “But casualty reports indicate that we’ve lost twenty-two people.”

              Tamara nodded, repressing a sigh.  There was no time for that now.  She could play the blame game and brood about it all later.  “Understood,” she said instead. 

              The chief engineer came on the line.  “Captain, we’re not in terrible shape, all things considered.  “I had to reroute a whole bunch of the power conduits what with the side of the ship being blown out, so you can’t stress the shields too much.  Shields nodes on that side of the ship are gone of course.  So are the missile launchers and the rail guns on that side.  Damn,” the engineer replied, shaking his head on the display.  “We just lost the control and power linkages for two of the heavy laser cannons on the topside.”

              Tamara nodded.  Her own display was showing the same information.  “What about hull integrity?  Can we handle combat maneuvers?”

              Fayyad al Fakhir, chief engineer of the
Cavalier
, nodded back to her.  “Yes, ma’am.  I’ve got a welding team putting up a few extra braces.  We can maneuver right now, but I’d recommend against any fancy flying until we can get things secured.”

              “Understood, Chief.  Keep me apprised.”  She cut the connection.  “Mister Wymea, lay in a course to intercept the
Leytonstone,
but keep it nice and steady.”

              “Aye, Captain,” he replied.  “I’m getting response from the Chief, Captain.  I can maintain a speed of one seventy-five.”

              “Do it.”

              “Engaging engines,” the pilot replied.  After a moment.  “We’ll intercept the cruiser in one hour and four minutes.  They’ve been accelerating away from us since we broke contact.  They’ll be just about in weapons’ range of the station by that point.”

              Tamara nodded, gritting her teeth.  “Understood.  Hopefully the Chief will be able to get the structural integrity up so that we can catch them with some time to spare.”

              Vincent Eamonn was seated at his usual chair in the wardroom aboard his ship, the bulk freighter
Grania Estelle
with a cup of coffee on the table before him.  He was reading over the report from his chief of security, the wolf woman Saiphirelle.

             
My team is on the station now, Captain.  We’ve secured Operations and Environmental.  We’ve policed up those of the invader force that are still alive, there were fifteen, all told, all but three of them wounded.  I’ve also managed to capture the leader, a Glacis Ghovorak.  He was more than willing to surrender, so we stripped his clothes, weapons, and all the rest, gave him a prison jumpsuit and tossed him into a cell down in the brig.  I’ve got the rest of his people in the brig.

              My second group is on the
Kara
.  There was no problem securing the ship, even less so than the station.  There was no resistance and George Miller was easily able to get to the bridge and assume control.  He isn’t happy with the control stations, apparently the fixes that the locals did to get the ship up and running were slipshod at best, worse than before we fixed her up back a few months ago.  The small prize crew we have aboard seems to have things well in hand and my security teams have locked the crew in one of the cargo bays.  The bays have been retrofitted into living quarters and we made sure that there were no active consoles, weapons or anything else that they would be able to make mischief.  I also made sure to have my team inform the crew that if they misbehave, I’ll have the atmo pumped down out of the room until they pass out.  Whether we turn the air back on depends on your mood.

              Vincent found himself chuckling at that.  He’d given Saiphirelle orders to pacify the ship and the station, but he didn’t want a bloodbath.  There’d been far too much killing already and with Samair and her ships duking it out with the battlecruiser, there was certainly going to be even more today.  Turan and his people were over on the station, assisting with all of the casualties, which included the station’s chief of security, and Saiphirelle’s sister, Corajen Nymeria, who had been critically wounded in the fighting.  A few were being stabilized and transferred back to the
Grania Estelle
’s sickbay.  The medical contingent aboard the station was good sized, but they simply couldn’t handle the load.  Those who were too injured to move too far, like Chief Corajen, were brought to the station sickbay to be treated.  Turan himself had taken over the surgery for Chief Nymeria himself.  He trusted no one else to handle it.  She was in good hands, Vincent knew.

              Which left the problem of the
Kara.
  Tamara had probably done the right thing in seizing the ship, citing grounds that the
Kara
had lugged the mercenaries over from the planet and dropped them off at the station.  Hell, now that the
Kara
was in his hands, they could reconfigure it again but this time to carry cargo.  A ship that size, with about a third of the cargo capacity of the
Grania Estelle
would be invaluable in increasing trade in the nearby region.

              The problem was the ship itself.  The government was scream bloody murder that FP had seized possession of Seylonique property.  Most likely the word “unprovoked” would be thrown around, and FP would be crucified in the local press. 
Grania Estelle
had sensor recordings, undoubtedly
Cavalier
had some too.  Vincent would have to check with the Kutok mining station to see about their records, but he had little doubt they’d have some record of armed boarding parties coming aboard the station from the
Kara
.  But Vincent doubted anyone outside of the company would care about the facts, or even evidence.  All they would see, and the government would see to that, was that an evil corporation run by outsiders had stolen government property, killed Seylonique citizens and then shot up the
Leytonstone
.  Hopefully that last would show Tamara and her fellows victorious over the battlecruiser, but either way, it would look bad for FP.  He probably would have to give the ship back, but he would make sure that he got his say in the media and that he was magnanimously returning it to the government, despite how much damaged they had cost him and his company.

              “Stella?” he called out to the empty room. 

              The holo projector over the table lit up and the image of a teenage girl, wearing a shipsuit with dark hair pulled back appeared, as though she was standing on the table.  She had purple stripes on her cheeks and a trio of red streaks in her hair, which went straight back from the hairline at her forehead all the way back to the tips of her ponytail.  “Yes, Captain?” the AI asked.

              “Have Serinda get a message to the
Samarkand
,” he said, referring to FP’s constructor ship, which was a few light minutes away, digging around in the asteroid belt.  “If they’re not already aware of what’s going on, give them the full update.  Inform them that we’ll be in touch in a few hours, but for now maintain operations.”

              “Understood, sir.”  She nodded.

              “Any updates on the fight going on with the
Leytonstone
?”

              Stella nodded, her face grim.  “The fight continues.  From what my long range sensors have picked up, Tamara and her ships have been harassing the battlecruiser.”  She paused.  “That’s odd.”

              “What?”

              “The
Leytonstone
is accelerating toward us.  And it looks like the fighters are staying with her, continuing to harass, but the corvette has broken contact.”

              Vincent felt his spine go cold.  “Destroyed?”

              She shook her head.  “No, Captain, not as far as I can tell.  We’re too far out for me to get a clear reading, but I’m still reading the
Cavalier
’s beacon ID and power signature.”

              He sighed in relief.  “Well, that’s something.  But you said the
Leytonstone
is coming here?”

              “Well, they were anyway,” she pointed out.

              “Yeah, but we can’t stop her.  Hell, it was iffy whether Tamara’s forces would be able to stop that ship.”

              Stella nodded.  “Statistically only about a twenty-seven percent chance of success, pitting a corvette and twenty-six fighters against a damaged battlecruiser.”

              Vincent snorted.  “Not great odds, Stella.  And that’s it?  Twenty-seven percent?  We don’t even know the status of the battlecruiser.”

              She shrugged.  “I could go into the facts that we do know, Captain.  All the data that I’ve collected from the orbital’s datanet and from the rumors I’ve pieced together, as well as other information I’ve gotten from the
Kara’s
databanks.  I don’t know how interested in all if it you’d be.  Suffice it to say, though, while the
Leytonstone
certainly won’t be up to full combat capability, it’ll certainly be dangerous.”

              He sighed.  “But twenty-seven percent, Stella?  That’s just insulting.”

              The AI laughed.  “Perhaps.  Maybe Korqath and Tamara can pull it out of the fire.  It wouldn’t be the first time.”

              Vincent gave a small smile in return.  “I hope so.  Is there anything we can do to help?”

              Stella sighed, a very human gesture, something she didn’t need to do since she wasn’t organic and didn’t need air to breathe.  “Not that I can see, Captain.  I mean, we have a few more days before enough of the fighters we’re building are ready.  We have four on the deck right now going through final checks, but it would be another day before those are ready.  But we also don’t have any pilots for them.”

              He sighed again.  “I guess that’s out.  And I’m not going to bring the big girl,” he patted the table, “into battle.  I’m seriously considering leaving this area and heading over to the
Samarkand
.”

              Stella frowned, steepling her fingers.  “Well, I can’t argue with your thought about keeping me out of the line of fire, but what about all the people?  The FP employees, the security teams and the crew off this ship on the
Kara
and the Kutok mine?  We can’t leave them.”