Stars of Blood and Glory (27 page)

“
My men have located the
Demon of
Tenguri,
”
said Colonel Webb, his voice noticeably calm. “It’s at seventeen
hundred kilometers from our position, at the center of the enemy
fleet.”

Katsuichi looked out the forward
window, but all he could see was the engine glow of the nearest
friendly ships. He tapped the keypad on his armrest and brought up
the holographic projection of the battle, with the
Demon of
Tenguri
clearly marked near the center.

“
Are all our ships in?” he asked,
frowning as he studied the hologram. “Three of them are
missing.”

“
Sorry, sir,” said the
communications officer. “We’ve just barely re-established
contact—plotting positions now.”

Three blue dots flickered into existence
as the nearest red dots began to converge into tight battle
formations. Since Katsuichi and Colonel Webb’s fleets had just
jumped into the sector, their ships were scattered haphazardly
across nearly a thousand kilometers of space.

“
I’ll order my men to establish
formations and take the perimeter,” said Colonel Webb, glancing up
from his terminal. “We won’t let that bastard Tagatai
escape.”

“
He won’t try to,” said Katsuichi
softly. “If he runs from this fight, he’ll lose the loyalty of his
commanders, and the Hameji fleets will fall into chaos. No, he’ll
try to surround us with a pincer attack and cut us off from the
rest of the fleet—establishing a perimeter will only spread our
forces too thin.”

“
Then what do you
propose?”

Katsuichi stared at the hologram
in the center of the room before him. While the light blue marks
representing Webb’s ships moved to evade the Hameji battle
formations, the dark blue ones representing his own moved to
position themselves between the
Divine Wind
and the advancing Hameji. Overhead, the
starfield flashed white and pink as the smaller ships began to
exchange fire.

“
We must push forward,” he said.
“Charge their formations directly and take the battle to
Tagatai.”

“
You’re mad,” said Colonel Webb,
rising violently from his seat. “No one has defeated the Hameji
with a frontal assault—you’ll lose half your ships just to push
through the outside line.”

“
At least half,” said Katsuichi.
“But that’s the only way to win this, Colonel—and I intend to lead
from the front. If you wish to increase your chances of survival,
you’ll command your men to join us.”

Colonel Webb glanced from him to the other
faces around the bridge and back again. His cheeks were red, though
whether from rage or from terror, it was difficult to tell.

“
You damn Rigelans all have a
suicide wish,” he muttered, slowly lowering to his seat. “Very
well—but wait for my men to go in first and draw them off. No use
charging forward until we have a clear opening.”

“
An excellent strategy,” said
Katsuichi, nodding. “Gather the fleet around the
Divine Wind
and prepare to
charge the
Demon of Tenguri
at my command.”

“
Yes, sir,” said the
communications officer, her voice barely holding steady. On the
central hologram, the giant red point marking Tagatai’s flagship
warily circled the fray, like a predatory hunter of the deep
circling a school of fish, waiting for the right moment to
strike.

* * * * *

“
Deploy cluster mines along the
orbital to our rear. I don’t want anything following
us.”

“
That’s not going to stop their
fighter drones, Captain.”

“
It’ll divert their gunboats, at
least. And Krikoryan, see if we can’t take a few of them out with
our missiles.”

“
Arming, sir,” said the old
cyborg.

“
Wait,” said Abaqa, his head
spinning. “At least give me a chance to make contact.”

Danica raised an eye at him, while the alarms
continued to blare throughout the ship. “The Hameji don’t open a
line to their enemies while they’re in combat. What makes you think
they’ll listen?”

“
We can take the bastards,” said
the pilot, his eyes burning with the same rage that he’d unleashed
on Abaqa before. “Captain, if we divert their gunships away from
the orbital, we can—”

“
Not now, Avanadze,” said Danica,
silencing him without taking her eyes off Abaqa. “What do you
propose?”

“
I—I just need to break the
encryption on their transmissions,” said Abaqa, glancing
frantically around him. “It shouldn’t be hard—just give me a few
minutes.”

“
We’ll be in range within
seconds,” said Danica, her voice colder than vacuum. “I suggest you
get to work.”

“
Right,” he said, rushing to the
cybernetics officer’s seat. Roman turned and eyed him suspiciously
with his natural eye, but Abaqa did his best to ignore that. His
heart raced, and his hands trembled as he brought up the
transmissions. Of all the ways to die while on campaign, he never
thought—

“
Hameji drones are breaking
through,” said the flight commander, the tension evident in his
voice. “Interception is imminent.”

“
Get up a plasma screen and
reroute all auxiliary power to the laser-stars,” said Danica. “I
don’t want anything to—”

Without warning, a series of explosions
rocked the ship, make the floor lurch and reel. Abaqa barely caught
himself from falling out of his chair, while Danica stumbled.

“
Captain, they’re using kamikaze
tactics!”

“
Drop us to a lower orbital and
get those laser-stars firing hot. Damage report?”

“
Top sublight engine is
off-line,” said the chief engineer, his old, sallow cheeks growing
pale. “Starboard sensors damaged but still functional.
Communications array—”

Another set of explosions rocked
them, this time sending Abaqa sprawling to the floor.
This isn’t how it’s
supposed to end,
he thought desperately to himself.
Please, not like this!

“
Tajjashvili, why are those
suicide drones getting through?”

“
I’m on it, Captain. Establishing
defensive screen, but it’s difficult with the Hameji jamming our
transmissions.”

“
Laser-stars firing,” said Roman.
“Next wave will not get through.”

“
Damage?”

“
We’ve lost a lot of armor
plating and most of the weapons on the starboard side,” said the
engineer. “The engine’s coming back online, but we’ve completely
lost our communications array.”

“
What?” said Abaqa, pulling
himself back up off the floor. His legs went numb and his knees
began to shake.

“
Communications are down,” Roman
confirmed.

“
Down? But—but how am I supposed
to—”

“
That’s enough,” said Danica,
silencing him with a single glance. He shrank back in his seat, but
inwardly, he wanted to scream.

* * * * *

Roman watched the scanners
closely as the last wave of Hameji fighter drones dispersed and
retreated, sliced to shreds by the
Tajji Flame’s
defenses. The few surviving fighters
still under Tajjashvili’s control reformed into consolidated
squadrons, but the enemy starships were nowhere to be seen. No
doubt the Hameji commanders had spread out into different orbitals,
determined to cut them off on the other side of the rogue planet.
They’d won for now, but only for the moment. The Hameji would be
back.

“
Corporal Tajjashvili, report,”
said Danica, ever the calm, collected leader in front of her
men.

“
The last fighter drones are
dispersing,” Zura reported. “They’ve sustained too many casualties
to mount another attack, and appear to be in retreat.”

“
And what about our fighter
squadrons?” she asked.

“
Smashed to bits, I’m afraid.
Losses total out at seventy-two percent, with almost all of them
irreparably destroyed. In the next engagement, our fighters will be
all but useless.”

Just like final battle of the
Revolution,
Roman thought to himself.

Danica nodded. “Thank you, Corporal. Roman,
any sign of the enemy on the scanners?”

“
No, Captain, they are not in
line of sight. I suspect they have taken converging orbitals and
hope to intercept on other side of planet.”

“
They won’t have long to wait,”
said Yuri, his fingers twitching nervously. “This rock of a planet
is so small, the orbitals are barely larger than that of a small
moon. We only have about twenty minutes before the Hameji converge
on us again.”

“
Thank you, Lieutenant,” said
Danica, nodding curtly at him before turning to Mikhail, the
engineer. “Konstantin, can you give me a damage report?”

“
Yes, Captain. Our secondary
sublight engines have shut down, and appear too unstable to start
up again safely. The main communications array is smashed and
beyond repair—at least beyond anything I can do for it right now.
Starboard weapons arrays are mostly gone, as is most of the armor
plating on that side.”

“
In your estimation, are we in
any condition to fight?”

Of course not.

He paused for a moment. “No, Captain,” he
said, his voice uncharacteristically somber. “I’m afraid we
aren’t.”

“
We should jump out,” said Yuri,
speaking out of turn. “The FTL drives are still functional, and the
secondary one’s fully charged. If we can just get out
of—”

“
I’m afraid that’s not an
option,” said Danica, resuming her seat in the command chair. “By
now, the Hameji have no doubt peppered this sector with more than
enough beacons to interdict us. That explains why they aren’t
jumping any bombs on our position right now. If we run, we’ll just
have to fight them again in deep space.”

“
Then—then we should head to the
surface,” Yuri stammered. “Hide from these bastards. Wasn’t that
the original plan?”

Roman shook his head. “It will not work. They
know we are here—they will search us out and find us.”

A somber silence filled the bridge as the
full weight of the situation fell on them. Behind him, Abaqa
shifted and leaned forward.

“
Is there absolutely no way to
get the communications array operational?” he asked. “If I could
just get a message out to them—”

“
I’ll see what I can do,” said
Mikhail, “but I’m not too optimistic.”

“
We’ll have to plan our next move
as if that’s not an option,” said Danica. “Does anyone have any
other suggestions?”

A strange pulse in Roman’s cybernetic
implants alerted him to a mangled transmission, cut strangely
short. He recognized the signature as coming from the Gaian girl,
but it was garbled and didn’t make much sense. Frowning, he checked
the high-gee coffins, still occupied since Danica hadn’t lowered
the alert level. All of his men were accounted for, as well as
Doctor Avanadze and the princess—but Al-Najmi wasn’t.

“
Excuse me, Captain,” he said,
rising quickly to his feet. “I must go below-decks at
once.”

Danica turned to him and frowned. “Why,
Sergeant?”

“
Because Lieutenant Al-Najmi did
not make it to high-gee coffin before maneuvers, and may be
seriously injured.”

She nodded, her brows furrowed in concern. “I
see. Be as quick as you can, though—I need you back on the
bridge.”

“
Understood,” said Roman, palming
open the door to the main corridor. He stepped out briskly, the dim
lights flickering from damage sustained in the attack. His heat
vision gave him somewhat of a better view, but only just barely. As
the door hissed shut behind him, the silence enveloped him as
completely as the shadows and the darkness.

* * * * *

Kill them.

Rina’s heart raced as she crept down the
darkened hallway, watching her own movements as if through a
full-immersion holo simulation. She tried to stop, but her hands
only shook a little more as she took up her position in the
shadows. Down at the other end of the corridor, a door hissed open,
and footsteps announced the arrival of a victim.

No!
she screamed inwardly, trying to
resist. But instead of turning around, her hold on reality shifted,
and she found herself swimming through memories as a wave of nausea
and dizziness swept over her.

One moment, she was standing over a mangled
body, blood dripping down the side of a broken bottle she held
firmly in her hand. Around her, teenage thieves and street thugs
stared down in disbelief and fear. One of them turned and ran, and
the others soon followed.

Then her vision clouded over, and the next
thing she knew, she was perched on a cross-beam below a catwalk in
some industrial complex, dangling over a vat of foul-smelling
bacterial agents. Footsteps sounded above her, and she slipped the
barrel of the gun into the space between the grating. When a tall,
dark-haired man came into view, she brought him down with two quick
shots. He fell heavily, his face only inches from her own. In his
wide, dying eyes, she saw the same look of terror.