Probe Predators (20 page)

Drey looked at Kragon and saw his surprise at the statement. Drey turned to Katy, “That is how they’ll do it. Thank you for your insight, Admiral Kemper.” Katy turned red and nodded.

Jinx stared at Katy while she was looking at Drey and felt his heart stir. He forced the feelings out and turned back to the conference. He knew she had changed since their separation. She had lost something since and after a few moments, he saw what it was. Katy had been so in love with life that everything around her captured her attention. That part of her appeared to be gone. Her ability to focus had improved.

Drey looked around the room and turned to Kragon, “We are going to prepare to take on five ships. If they send fifty, we are still only going after five; M87 will have to handle the others.” Kragon shrugged and nodded. “We will go in with all our weapons active and determine how effective they will be against this enemy. How do you want to select the fleets making the attack?”

“I’ll send two, you’ll send two…” Kragon looked at Katy and said, “And the Zombies will take the fifth ship.”

Katy knew Kragon was still angry at the loss of his two pilots during the fleet exercise. She looked him in the eyes and didn’t blink.

Drey saw the exchange and knew something was going to have to be done to clear the air between those two. “That’s how we’ll do it. Admiral Kragon, if you’ll select the two from your fleets, Admiral Tollervar will choose ours based on their current rankings in our fleet exercises.”

The video continued discussing the Thresher’s blasters but Katy thought about taking on one of those monsters and worried about how many of her pilots were going to die. It appeared the number was going to be high.

T
he Command Claw looked at the reports and knew another gathering had to be done. Fifty ships were close to running out of stores and they had to be resupplied. He looked at the Claw commanding his Lead Ship and motioned him over. “We have to make another raid.”

“I’ve seen that.”

“We have to do it faster this time.”

“Perhaps you should send several ships to one planet to collect what we need and get out quickly.”

The Command Claw nodded absently and looked at possible planets that could be used, “I don’t want to attack one of their major planets and reveal our strength.”

“I suspect they know it after the last fiasco; however, I agree with you in principle.”

“How do you differ?”

“I’m still attempting to determine how they found our last incursion.”

The Command Claw put one of his pincer arms on his chair and rested his head on it. He took one of his gripping arms and absently scratched the base of his left antenna and thought for a moment. “They will eventually discover us.” He thought for a moment more and decided, “We’ll send five ships to the planet with eight warships. We’ll eliminate them and collect what we need. If we’re discovered, the five ships can protect each other while the operation is being completed.”

“I’ll issue the orders. The operation will begin momentarily.”

The Command Claw waved his pincer dismissing his Ship’s Claw and thought about dining on the Family when it arrived. He shivered in anticipated ecstasy.

• • •

“Drey.”

“Yes Moe.”

“I have five Thresher Warships powering up their systems.”

Drey jumped out of his chair, “Notify the fleets and get me them the coordinates as soon as you have them.”

“I’ll send them immediately and I’ll also jump a probe in for them to get a picture of what to anticipate.”

“Where is Admiral Tollervar?”

“He’s on Andi Montgomery’s Flagship. He’s going with them to the attack site.”

“Get him to contact the M87 Fleet Commander and keep them informed on what’s going on.”

“I’ve notified Admiral Tollervar and he’s making the contact now.”

“I want a feed sent to Kragon and my office in real time.”

“Done.”

“Moe.”

“Yes Drey.”

“It’s going to be bad; isn’t it?”

There was a long pause and Moe said, “Yes, it is.”

Drey pushed a button on his console and saw Cole appear, “They’re going in Cole. I’ll relay the feed I receive to your panel.”

Cole shook his head and worried about Andi, “Thanks. Drey.” Drey nodded and saw an image appear on his panel with five giant Orange Ships moving into orbit over a planet. He saw eight blasts and knew they were local warships being destroyed. His eyes narrowed as he thought, “Find a way to kill them!”

• • •

The five Union and Kilper Fleets arrived at the planet and saw the Thresher Ships had moved into a pentagram formation above the planet. It allowed them the best possible formation to offer defending fire to each other and was going to be almost impossible to attack without coming under fire from the Thresher’s hull blasters. The Union Fleets scattered and moved in on the ship assigned to each of them. It was murderous.

• • •

Mick Anderson Chancellor flew his needle away from the Orange Ship his wing had just attacked and saw that he was the only survivor of the twenty ships in is wing. All the others had been blasted into gas on their approach. One blaster beam had barely missed hitting his ship. He saw Union Ships were being destroyed at an incredible rate. He hated the Orange beast on his display. He looked at the image and saw the blasters on the Thresher’s hull turned and locked on any target at an incredible speed. However, they weren’t able to move in no time. “Vicky, how long does it take for those blasters above the thrusters to move to acquire a target?”

“From full left to right takes one tenth of a second.”

Mac thought about the time and said to his computer, “Vicky, if we go in FTL between two blasters that are pointed in opposite directions, how long would we have at our closest point of approach?”

“How close do you want to get?”

“Fleet thinks that if a shot can be taken from less than five miles, it might break through their force field.”

“You would have to come in on a parabolic curve in order to move away. You would be inside their range for three tenths of a second.”

“I understand I would be inside their range, but they wouldn’t have three tenths of a second to respond.”

“No, they would have about fifteen hundredths of a second.”

Mac thought about the idea and said, “It would be the blaster on our escape trajectory that would have the most time to hit us.”

“The one on our approach would never turn in time; the second could do it.”

Mac pulled up a picture of Vicky Downs on his display. She had ended their engagement when he joined the Navy and had taken a new lover. He loved her so much and he could not get over her loss. He placed his hand on the display and sighed. “Vicky, I want you to scan that ship and find two blasters pointing in opposite directions. The moment you find them, go to FTL and make the curve.”

“Mac, are you sure you want to do this?”

“I am.”

“We probably won’t survive the effort.”

“Do we have a chance to get a shot off?”

“I can hit them with two pegs and two String Blasters from my starboard side if we avoid the first blaster. I don’t think we’ll escape the second blaster.”

“Do you think it will do much damage to that ship?”

“I have no way of knowing.”

“Set it up, Vicky.”

“I’m moving in to two light seconds to react fast enough to try this.”

“Do what’s best. I want the view on my scanner done in normal mode.”

“It will happen in slow motion if I turn off the relativity dampers.”

“Will it affect our speed?”

“No.”

“I want to see what’s happening; turn them off.”

The Needle jumped and Mac watched the display. Suddenly, he saw two blasters turn away from each other and space changed as a blue FTL field appeared around his ship and the giant Orange Vessel began growing on his display.

The tiny Needle went in at just under the speed of light and the two blasters detected it as it arrived. The needle began a turn and moved to within three miles from the Thresher Ship directly outside the thruster band that circled the middle of the vessel. The first blaster did not swivel fast enough to get off a shot at the tiny Union Ship and the Needle fired two Pegs and two String Blasters at the massive thrusters directly to the side of them. The needle completed its turn and the second blaster completed its turn and the barrel began glowing preparatory to firing. As it fired its massive beam the hull it was on lifted in a giant explosion that blew the top and lower decks apart; the beam aimed at the needle missed. The explosion continued as each thruster on the side of the blast began going up in massive blasts. The blasts moved down the line of thrusters on each side of the Union hit and met on the opposite side of the giant Orange ship. The ship appeared to have a belt of fire surrounding it and then it disappeared in a massive explosion that rocked the Thresher ships holding station next to it.

Max saw the explosions and yelled, “Do it again, Vicky.”

The needle turned and bore down on the Thresher ship that was to the left side of the one destroyed. Vicky bore in on the thruster band where ten blasters on the hull were inoperative from the first ship’s destructive blast as it tore into the second Thresher Warship. The Needle fired again and the second ship blew up faster than the first. The three surviving Thresher Ships jumped away.

Mac sat in his chair drained of emotion. He watched the recording of his first attack run and saw the second blaster turning toward his ship and the barrel glowing just before firing. He jumped his ship back to his fleet and moved into formation where he saw hundreds of empty places. He was the only one in his wing’s rank. No one knew at that moment who had killed the two ships. It took two days of examining the probe’s data to find where the blasts on the two destroyed Thresher Warships had started and even then the recordings had to be slowed down to see the small ship that had done it. During that time, Mac stayed alone and suffered for the loss of his friends. When the Senior Staff discovered that one Pilot had killed both ships, they ordered the Admirals to find the pilot who had done it. The Needle’s transponder wasn’t recorded due to the fact it was traveling at close to light speed. It was going to take months for every ship’s flight records to be examined. They found him by accident.

• • •

Mac sat on Vicky and waited while the engineers serviced his ship. He thought about the loss of his close friends. You don’t train and work with others without developing close personal bonds. He knew he should have died with them and their loss, coupled with Vicky walking away from him, made him wish he had died as well.

An Engineer stepped into the port and said, “Sir, there are some severe heat marks on the hull of your ship.”

Mac glanced at him and said, “I suspect that happened when the thrusters blew up.”

“Pardon me; did you say when the thrusters blew up?”

“Yes, I guess we were closer than we should have been.” The engineer stared at Mac and saw him turn around in his chair and stare at the wall. He stepped out of the small ship and activated his communicator.

• • •

Mac stared at the wall and heard behind him, “Do you mind if I come on board?”

Mac sighed and swiveled his command chair around. He leaped to attention, “Yes Sir, you are welcome to come aboard my ship at any time, Sir.”

Andi Montgomery looked at Mac and saw he was a mess. He hadn’t shaved for days and looked thin and almost emaciated. “Captain, are you the one that killed two Thresher Warships?”

“Yes Sir. I apologize for acting without orders but my entire wing was killed in the initial attack.”

Andi’s expression softened and she went forward and hugged Mac. “Thank you for saving my pilots. They would all be dead but for your bravery.”

Mac was shocked and said, “I didn’t do anything brave, Sir. I just decided to do what I could.”

Andi shook her head and cried. So many had been killed and many more would be gone except for this modest pilot. Mac didn’t know what to do. What does one do when an Admiral is hugging you and weeping? He lifted his arms and patted her on the back. “It’s ok, Sir. It’s going to be ok.”

Andi stepped back and wiped her tears. She smiled as she cried and said, “I believe you’re right. Will you please download your records to my panel?”

“Yes Sir.”

Andi left and Mac sent the download. Thirty minutes before the entire Senior Command Team showed up, Mac received a call from the real Vicky. “Mac, Jennifer tells me that you attacked two alien warships. She tells me that she didn’t see any way for you to have survived those attacks.”

“Jennifer told you what?”

“I asked Jennifer to keep an eye on you and make sure you’re ok. She tells me you acted suicidal in making those attacks. What were you thinking!?!”

“Fulfilling my duties, Vicky. Why are you contacting me? You left, remember.”

“I left because I couldn’t bear the thought of you being killed. I just couldn’t handle it. I knew my life would end if something happened to you.” Mac could only stare at his display. Vicky stared at him and said, “You took those risks because of me.”

Mac blew out a breath and slowly nodded, “I had no reason to not do it.”

“Mac, you need to come home.”

“I don’t have a home, Vicky.”

“You’ll always have a home where my heart is, Mac. I need you here with me.”

“Vicky, it will be the same thing all over again. I’m a pilot of a Union Warship. I’m going to be at risk; nothing has changed.”

“I have, Mac. I know I may only have a short time with you, but that’s better than no time. I will still suffer if you die whether I’m with you or not. I need whatever time we can have until that happens.”

“What about Paco?”

“I sent him packing. He was only a distraction. Please forgive my stupidity and come back to me.”

“I’ll ask for leave. We’ll discuss this and see if we can’t work this out.”

“That’s all I want.” Vicky blew him a kiss and the panel went dark. Mac lowered his head and felt his heart beating again. He took a deep breath and smiled. “I suppose you’re going to change my name now.”