Traitor's Duty (8 page)

 There was a strange beauty to the tactical display, a series of intersecting lines tangling around each other as the pilots and tactical officers of dozens of ships and fighters worked their magic, each one attempting to gain the split-second advantage that might win them the battle. Alamo was gracefully curving in, on a direct course for the enemy battlecruiser, her fighters proceeding her in a sleek arrowhead formation.

 “Shuttle launched from Alamo, sir,” Spinelli said. “Moving fast, as well.”

 “Search and rescue?”

 “No, Captain,” the sensor operator said. “It’s heading for Thermopylae.”

 “I don’t envy them that job,” Ryder said. “Firing range with the enemy battlecruiser in two minutes.”

 Nodding, Logan said, “Do everything necessary to bring that bastard down, Ryder. Laser shots, missile salvos, throw rocks at them. Whatever it takes. Weitzman, try and get contact with them, offer them a chance at surrender.”

 “Unconditional surrender?”

 “No, damn it, I’ll talk terms. We’re here on a peace mission, and I’d rather be trading insults than missiles. Give them an honorable way out.”

 Shaking her head, Steele said, “They’ll fight to the end, sir. The consequences of failure…”

 “Let’s hope you are wrong about that, Sub-Lieutenant.”

 He settled back again as Alamo raced towards the enemy, letting Ryder handle the tactical details while he concentrated on the overall picture. Up ahead, the fighters were launching a salvo, six missiles racing towards their target in two directions. Alamo would be contributing another half-dozen to the battle in a few seconds.

 The enemy commander must know that Alamo’s arrival had ended any chance he had of winning. He’d pulled it close – Thermopylae’s withdrawal from the battle had wiped out the previous Triplanetary advantage and thrown their plans into confusion – but the game was up, and all he was doing was throwing away lives.

 “Energy spike,” Spinelli said. “They’re going for us, at extreme range.”

 “Plenty of time for our countermeasures to do their stuff,” Ryder said with a nod. “Working on it now.”

 “Watch them,” Steele replied. “They’ve had plenty of time to come up with some new tricks.”

 “I’ve got this, Sub-Lieutenant,” Ryder said, working her panel. Logan looked at her, saw the beads of sweat building up on her face, and then turned to his console, bringing up the hacking subroutines.

 “I’ll handle the countermeasures, Ryder. You concentrate on the rest of the battle.”

 “Yes, sir,” she said with a grateful smile. She turned back to the missile controls, locking targets into the computer to try and give a time-on-target impact, all twelve missi
le
s hitting the enemy at once. Logan focused instead on the incoming Cabal warheads.

 They were a surprisingly familiar design, a United Nations vintage from about nine years ago, considerably post-war, one he knew rather well.
Long ago, he'd run
a deep cover operation in the research office that developed it; the head technician was very susceptible to tequila.
He’d never run a ship countermeasures control before, but hacking was something he did know; he went straight to the intrusive programs, working his worms into their network, trying to wrest control.

 The first couple were all too easy; the leading missile had an error in
its
security programming, and he slammed it across into an adjacent target, resulting in a satisfying explosion. Immediately, the rest of the missiles spread out, lateral thrusters hurling them apart to prevent him trying that trick again. The self-destruct systems were his next target; on that mark of missile, they’d been legendarily easy to access, but he quickly realized that the Cabal had made some modifications to the design. Still, another missile turned back on itself, spiraling on its engine before exploding.

 Three left, almost half-way to their target. He smiled as he switched over to their on-board sensors, kept nice and simple as a rule. Visual lock, based on a target set by the tactical officer. Changing the target would be darn near impossible, but hacking into the image database was somewhat easier. He tapped a control, feeding an image of the Cabal battlecruiser into his system, then fired it off at the missiles, overwriting the original feed.

 As he worked, the lights dimmed for a second as Alamo fired another laser pulse, this time at the enemy ship, slicing into the hull armor. Excellent; that would provide a nice distraction while he finished his work, and a few seconds later, there were fifteen missiles heading for the enemy battlecruiser. He started to overwrite some of the security protocols, setting a few bots loose in the missile network, and looked back up at the tactical display.

 “That’s a good trick, sir,” Ryder said.

 “Enemy ship is trying to turn, sir,” Spinelli said. “Best guess is that he’s attempting to protect critical systems.”

 “Message from Gilgamesh,” Weitzman added. “Their target is heading towards the planet, and they’ve managed to restore sufficient attitude control to head back for the battle area. Estimated arrival in nine minutes.”

 “What condition are they in?”

 “Not good, sir. No hendecaspace drive, significant damage to outer hull and weapon systems.”

 “Let’s hope we can finish this one off first, then,” Logan replied. “Time to impact?”

 “First wave in ten seconds.” Ryder looked up, and said, “Second salvo ready to fire.”

 He’d missed the firing of the first salvo completely while he was working the countermeasures.

 “Give me the score as soon as we get it.”

 A few of the tracks had winked out, the Cabal security team desperately working to protect their ship, but nine still remained, entering the terminal phase of their flight, and in a split-second, they were gone, leaving nothing but damage and devastation in their wake.

 “Multiple impacts!” Ryder said. “Outgassing oxygen, the ship’s tumbling, and we’ve taken out most of their launch tubes. I’d say they are out of the combat.”

 “Can you get Marshall?”

 “No, sir,” Weitzman said. “Wyvern’s long-range communications are out.””

 “Another hit?”

 “Power failure.”

 Shaking his head, Logan said, “Get a damage control team out there at once. We’re not going to need them, and they might. Is the enemy ship in a mood to talk now?”

 “Oddly enough, sir, yes.”

 An image flashed onto the viewscreen, a man with a pair of gashes across his forehead standing on a smoke-filled bridge, wreckage everywhere. One of the impacts must have been pretty close-by to do that much damage.

 “This act of aggression….” the figure began, but Logan cut him off.

 “We can talk about ancient history all you want, but you and your crew don’t have the time. I want to get medical teams over to you right now, and some engineers from our tender to try and patch you up enough to limp for orbit.”

 “I will not surrender.” He turned, then said, “Hale, prepare for ramming speed.”

 “I don’t want your surrender, I just want a cease-fire! This whole damn battle shouldn’t have happened in the first place. We leave things as they are and let the diplomats sort out the details later.”

 “I have to defend this system…”

 “All you’ll be is component atoms if you carry on with this.”

 Another man stepped in behind him as the Cabal commander said, “I repeat, if…”

 The screen went blank for a moment, and when it cleared again, a different figure – with far less ornamentation on his uniform, was present. “We’re willing to stand down, Captain. Send your medical and rescue teams. I have disabled our defensive/offensive systems, and am willing to trust your intentions.”

 “What happened just?”

 “My predecessor has been taken ill.”

 “I see,” Logan said. “Our support teams are on the way. No Espatiers, though if you do something stupid…”

 “You don’t need to threaten me, Captain. I am aware that our situation is dire, and that we don’t have any options remaining to us except to hope for mercy.” Pausing, he added, “Our dead will be avenged, though. Have no doubt about that.”

 Ryder, moving over to his side, said, “Mutiny?”

 “Looks like it,” he replied, “Don’t get ideas. I just hope he’s wrong about the vengeance.” Resting back in the command chair, he continued, “Now we’ve got to try and put all the pieces back together. What a god-damned mess.”

Chapter 8

 Marshall looked at the approaching ship as it grew closer on the shuttle’s viewscreen, his eyes drinking in every detail of the hull as they closed for docking. Caine, at the pilot’s seat, attempted to concentrate on her flying, but kept
glancing across
at him, a smile on her face. He knew that he’d missed Alamo, but until this moment, he hadn’t quite realized how much she meant to him. Now he was seconds away from boarding her once again, and he struggled to collect himself.

 “Now on final approach,” Caine said. “I think we can let the computers handle the post-flight, can’t we? I don’t want to miss this either.”

 “Fine, fine,” he said, as the shuttle coasted in towards the docking bay, hooking itself into the elevator airlock as it began its ride inside the ship, a hissing noise growing as the pressure rose on the far side. He tugged at his uniform and walked into the rear section, standing in front of the airlock. Cunningham had already unstrapped himself from his couch, and clapped him on the back.

 “Relax, Danny,” he said.

 “Easy to say.”

 A green light winked on, and the hatch slid open, the ramp coming down. He looked around the hangar bay, a couple of dozen people standing at attention, all of whom he recognized. Quinn with
his
wife,
Tabitha
Dixon, standing next to him in front of the flight crews and technicians, Ryder over on the far side with all but the on-duty bridge watch, Logan at the head of the group wearing a suspiciously-new dress uniform, Weitzman, Spinelli, Ivanov from the deck crew, Chief Washington, all of them had turned out to meet him. He took three steps down from the shuttle, and took a deep breath.

 “It’s good to be back.” He looked at Logan, and asked, “Permission to come aboard?” 

 “As if you needed to ask,” Logan replied with a smile. He pulled a datapad out of his pocket and passed it across, continuing, “I took good care of her, and with the help of the Popovich I’ve even filled up the gas tank. Really, though, she isn’t mine.”

 “Logan, I’m happy to keep things as they are.”

 “I’m not. Take it.”

 “Go on, Danny,” Caine said, moving down from the cockpit airlock. “It’s a gift.”

 “In that case, as of this time, this date, I am hereby assuming command of this vessel. Have the duty officer record this in the log. Captain Winter, I relieve you, sir.”

 “I stand relieved,” Logan said, his smile growing. “And never have I been happier to see anyone in my life, Captain.”

 “Condition report?”

 Quinn stepped forward, and said, “No damage from the battle, sir, and I had a chance to do a quick overhaul at Carter Station. She’s ready for anything, and supplied for an extended cruise.”

 “Crew status?”

 “With the exception of three on the bridge and two in engineering, you’re looking at them,” Logan replied. “We’d better have a quiet talk as to why, but we’ve only got a crew compliment of twenty-nine, including our three fighter pilots.”

 “All volunteers,” Dixon said. “Every single one. And the only reason there aren’t more people here is that Logan didn’t ask anyone with families to come along.”

 “What about our guest?”

 “Ensign Cooper dropped him off ten minutes ago. Apparently he didn’t put up any sort of a fight, and I’m not really surprised about that. The game was up and he knew it.”

 Shaking his head, Cunningham said, “I still don’t understand what could have got into Frank’s head to make him do something like that. Treason, desertion, mutiny…”

 “I can explain it,” Logan said. “We’d better speak privately, then I’ll have him brought in.”

 Nodding, Marshall turned back to the waiting crowd, “Words can’t describe how it felt to see all of you again, to see this ship appear in the system, and how proud I am of each and every one of you. We’ve got a hell of a long road left in front of us, but with a little luck we’ll all get to the other side in one piece. Let’s get to work.”

 Logan waved Marshall into the deck officer’s cabin, sitting down behind the desk with a sigh. Cunningham, Caine and Ryder stepped in with them, crowding the confined office, a resigned look on Ryder’s face.

 “Problem, Lieutenant?” Marshall asked, then after seeing her rank insignia, continued, “I’m sorry, Senior Lieutenant.”

 “Logan promoted me when we got back to Sol. Quinn as well. You aren’t going to like the rest of it.”

 “Danny,” Logan said, struggling to find the words, “You were sent here illegally.”

 “I know,” he replied. “We found out a few weeks ago, but by then were committed to battle. Not much we could do about it. How far have things gone back home?”

 “The President is in the process of being impeached, and the Vice-President is using it to hold up the peace treaty in the hopes of starting a war with the Cabal. Enough Fleet officers are involved that I can’t trust anyone
not in
this room, and Intelligence is sitting this one out.”

 “A coup?” Caine said, almost yelling. “There’s a god-damned coup going on back home?”

 “Oh, it’s a very constitutional one. They’ve got the President on charges of corruption, dead to rights, but they’re abusing the situation for their own ends. People have already died, Deadeye,” Logan said, shaking his head. “We had to leave Maggie Orlova and Kristin Harper behind. Last I heard, they were on the run. Chambers as well, my Political Officer.”

 “Who is on our side?”

 Shrugging, Logan replied, “My guess is that we’re up against the Progressive senior figures, a few people with the Vice-President, and some key Fleet officers. I really don’t think that there are that many of them, maybe no more than a hundred, but they’ve managed to tangle themselves up in the power structure. The problem is that they’ve managed to wrestle control of the agenda.”