Alarm of War (51 page)

Dammit!

“What?” someone started to say.

“Grab those two!” Cookie said, biting back her frustration. They were in the cafeteria! Not the engineering deck, but the bloody cafeteria. Romano had screwed up royally. Cookie sighed. No help for it now. The second wave would come in fifteen minutes, so she had to move her troops out. She hopped onto one of the tables.

“Get off your asses and grab those two guys!” The two cooks were quickly taken into custody. When they reached Cookie, she squatted down on the table top and placed the rifle muzzle against the head of the taller one. His eyes kept shifting and rolling and she figured he would be easier to break.

“Where is the Bridge?” she asked in halting Dominion.

The terrified cook stammered directions. The cafeteria was at the midpoint in the ship. The Bridge was most of the way to the stern, just forward of the Engineering section.

“Hold up, Sargent Ortiz,” said Master Sergeant Zamir, who stood beside her. He eyed the cook. “Which way to the bridge?” His Dominion was halting, but clear enough. He pointed to the front of the cafeteria. “That way, or-” he pointed in the opposite direction. “That way?”

The cook exchanged a quick, shaded glance with his fellow chef, and if Cookie hadn’t been watching closely, she would have missed the subtle tightening of his jaw and the way his eyes half closed.

“That way,” he mumbled, gesturing to the back of the cafeteria. Cookie exchanged a knowing look with Zamir. The cook was lying through his teeth. Cookie stood up.

“Listen up! Change in plans! We landed in the cafeteria, not the Engineering deck. We are moving out for the Bridge!” She glanced at Sergeant Zamir, who nodded. “Take ‘em, Sergeant Ortiz,” he told her. “I’ll take the next wave and go to Engineering.”

Cookie looked at the Marines waiting for her orders. They all stared back at her, mostly young, mostly nervous, all excited and twitching with the need to
do
something
. And it struck her then that except for the surviving handful of Marines from the
Yorkshire
, none of these soldiers had ever been in a real fight, had never actually shot at an enemy. And here they were, dumped onto an enemy ship full of hostiles with no easy way to get home.

For a moment, she was literally breathless with the overwhelming need to protect them from harm.

“You are Royal Fleet Marines!” she told them, enunciating each word carefully. “We are not gettin’ off this damn ship unless we kick ass and take names!” She pointed to the bridge. “Up there is a Dominion admiral fixin’ to kill our queen! The only thing that’s goin’ stop him is all of you!” A collective growl went up from them, not the roar of a crowd at a rally, but the growl of one hundred and twenty trained killers who would die before they let any goddam tin pot Duck admiral kill
their
queen.

She smiled at them, almost laughing with the sheer pleasure of it all, hoping that in time Hiram could forgive her.

“Follow me,” she said simply. And they did.

Always together. Never alone.

On the
Yorkshire,
Lori Romano heard the shout that the second group of Marines was strapped in and ready to be transported to the Dominion battleship. She nodded, and then pressed the button to energize the Tilleke transporter device.

Nothing happened.

Frowning, she pressed it again. Still nothing. Conscious of the first wave of panic, she scanned the instrument panel and only then realized that the power level was reading zero.

“Oh, shit!” she cursed. No more Marines would be transported to the Dominion battleship.

When the
Emerald Isle
had been destroyed, the
New Zealand’s
sensors picked up the beacons of several dozen life pods. Emily had left them, knowing that the Ducks would monitor the beacons, hoping to catch somebody trying to rescue the survivors.

The survivors would have to wait.

She’d taken the
New Zealand
deeper into the minefield, leaving behind decoys and reconnaissance drones, then turned and moved quickly parallel to its front.

“Whisker laser signal from
Yorkshire,
Captain,” Betty said. Emily opened the channel. “Grant, did they make it over?”

Grant Skiffington shook his head. “I don’t know. They disappeared from our boat bay, but who knows if they landed on the Duck battleship. The second bunch never even left. The AI boffin running the show says there is some sort of power failure and she’s trying to fix it, but no luck so far.”

“No message from them? From Cookie?”

He shrugged. “No radio. They can’t take metal through the transporter.”

Emily blinked. Cookie had told her that, of course. Over one hundred Marines had just gone onto an enemy battleship with no way to call for support and no way to get back. “So they’re on their own, then,” she murmured.

“Pretty much,” he agreed. He took a breath. “Do you have a plan, Em?”

She nodded. “Yeah, hide and seek, followed by flashlight tag. Our recon drones show they have started to blast through the minefield again. We need to distract them. I’ll give you the details in a few minutes. Stay close. Make sure the
Kent
and
Galway
stay with us.”

“Status?” Admiral Mello demanded. Captain Pattin shuffled some notes in her hand. Her face was sweat-stained and her hair, normally caught tightly in a severe bun, had worked its way loose and hung in rebellious disarray in front of her face. She pushed it aside irritably. “We killed several Vicky ships, including one confirmed kill on a cruiser, the
Emerald Isle.
Sensors detected several of the Vicky “Omega” drones that are only launched when a ship has been significantly damaged or destroyed. No life pods from the ships we hit with anti-matter weapons, but quite a few from the
Emerald Isle.
We’re leaving a drone there to watch in case the Vickies attempt a rescue.”

Mello snorted contemptuously. No one in their right mind would expose themselves in the middle of a battle to pick up life pods.

“There are still some Vicky ships in the vicinity,” Pattin continued. “Could be as few as three or as many as seven. We don’t know what class of ships, but we have detected several readings that turned out to be decoys.”

“Logistics?”

“Fuel is getting low, but it’s not yet urgent. We have a pretty good supply of standard missiles and, of course, laser weapons. None of the cruisers have any anti-matter missiles left, but
Vengeance
still has five.” She pursed her lips. “Enough to destroy or cripple the Atlas, but not enough to blast through the rest of the minefield and
then
destroy the Atlas.”

Admiral Mello shrugged. No matter. They’d blast through using standard missiles and lasers if they had to, as long as they reached the Atlas before Vicky reinforcements arrived.

“Notify the cruisers,” he ordered. “Resume working on the minefield. One cruiser to stay on guard in case this little band of Vickies decides to come back. And call up the
Fortitude;
we’ll see if her new captain has more guts than the old one.”

• • • • •

Emily sat on her right hand to stop it from shaking, and pretended that she did not see Chief Gibson’s worried glance.

Last time her tiny little task force had tried to sneak from the edge of the minefield, they had been spotted immediately and had been pummeled by Dominion laser fire before they could withdraw.
New Zealand
had lost another missile tube,
Kent
lost several more crew and
Galway’s
drive was now at fifty percent effectiveness. The Dominions were on full alert and she had to find a better way to get past their defenses.

The ship’s chime sounded softly, signifying the start of a new day. Chief Gibson came to her chair and handed her a steaming cup of coffee. Emily held it carefully in her left hand.

“And the joy of the day to you, Captain,” Gibson said formally, clasping his hands behind his back. Behind him, Emily could see Tobias Partridge look up with a puzzled expression on his face. A giddy, silly thought welled up inside her and she impulsively followed it.

“Oh, aye, ‘tis a rare fine day, indeed,’ Emily said in a dreadful attempt at a Scottish accent. “Wouldn’t you agree, Mr. Rudd?” She pronounced it “R-o-o-o-d.”

The expression on Partridge’s face changed from puzzlement to alarm.

Rudd glanced up, caught Partridge’s expression and the choking expression on Chief Gibson’s face as he tried to stifle a laugh.

“Oh, ‘tis a grand day!” he said cheerfully, his Scottish accent even more hideous than Emily’s. “A true wonderous day, full of sun and laughter, love for our fellow man and perhaps a wee missile up the ass.”

“Sirs,” blurted Partridge, “are you quite all right?”

The three of them broke into laughter, tears streaming down their cheeks. Emily gasped, then laughed, then gasped some more. Chief Freidman, just back from Sick Bay, looked at the three of them, frowned in displeasure and went back to his console, muttering under his breath. Partridge simply stared at them, wide eyed, until Emily weakly waived a hand in his direction.

“It’s nothing, Mr. Partridge, really. Just three officers blowing off a little tension, that’s all.”

Partridge, looking skeptical, turned back to his console. Rudd leaned closer to Emily and Chief Gibson. “But it
is
a rare fine day, isn’t it?” he asked solemely.

Emily looked at Alex, then at Chief Gibson. “A rough start, maybe, but it has the makings of a
very
good day,” she said, and nodded to each of them.

“Well, then,” said Chief Gibson, “down to business, I think. Captain, what are your orders?”

“They expect a feint, then an attack, so let’s give it to them.” She told them what she wanted to do and they went off to make things ready. She glanced at Partridge, bent over his console, absorbing everything he saw like a sponge. She hoped he lived through this day.

She held up her right hand. It no longer shook. Well, not much.

• • • • •

Thirty minutes later a Victorian cruiser and four destroyers emerged from the minefield. They fired several missiles at the waiting Dominions. The Dominion retaliation was massive and immediate. A torrent of laser beams raked the Vickies and one by one they lost power, hulls open to space.

“Sensors!” Admiral Mello barked. “Keep your eyes peeled! That was just a feint. In the next few moments the real attack force will come out of the Vicky minefield. Lock on immediately and feed the coordinates to the laser mounts!” Then he sat back, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. The Vickies were running out of ships and ideas, and he would use their predictability to kill them.

• • • • •

Emily watched with satisfaction as the Dominions destroyed the five drones. They got their feint, she thought, now let’s give them the “real” attack.

“Okay,” Emily said through the needle laser comm, “let’s do it again. We’ll all target the same ship and see if we can put it out of action.”

“If they’ve caught on, they’ll be waiting to pound us,” snapped Lisa Stein from the
Kent.
“You’re taking a big chance here.”

“Speed is the key,” Emily cautioned. “Flush your weapons, then turn and run right away. Don’t go too far from the minefield or you’ll get caught in the open.”

On the
Galway,
Andy Richter grimaced. The
Galway’s
drive sysem was running rough, first weakening, then surging. It made fine control of the ship’s speed impossible. He mentally shrugged. Nothing for it.

“Let’s do it,” Emily said.

On board the Dominion
Vengeance
, the Sensors Officer saw five more ships suddenly dart from the minefield. The first missiles shot towards the Dominion task force while he was still sending the coordinates to the laser batteries. He hastily finished, then slapped the ‘Enter’ button.

Two seconds later, the three primary battle lasers on each of the five Dominion cruisers and the nine four-inch lasers on the
Vengeance
simultaneously fired. The Dominion cruisers targeted the Vicky cruiser while the
Vengeance
fired on the four destroyers.

On the battle display, the lights representing the targets blossomed briefly, then went out. For a moment the bridge of the
Vengeance
was silent. Admiral Mello nodded in satisfaction. His intuition had been-

“Admiral!” the Sensors Officer yelled in alarm. “Sensors show the wreckage mass at no more than ten tons. Those were
decoys
, not Victorian war ships!”

Then, from the spot where the first decoy drones had appeared minutes earlier,
more
ships appeared. And these, the Sensors Officer realized in a sick panic, were the real ships, not decoys.

The laser capacitors shrilled as they began their recharge cycle. It would take at least two minutes to recharge.

All weapons fire!” Emily screamed into the comm. She grinned ferociously. They had caught the Ducks with their lasers recharging. The Ducks had expected a feint, so she had given them a
double
feint, with her ships emerging where the first set of drones had appeared.

So far, so good.

The cruiser they were targeting was the one on the Dominions’ right flank, closest to Emily’s surviving ships. Ten lasers struck it amidships. Thirty three missiles followed. Twelve were killed by anti-missile fire, but the rest struck home. Incredibly, the Dominion cruiser was not destroyed outright, but it turned sluggishly, trailing an ugly smear of hull plating, atmosphere and bodies, and began to limp away.

“Pull back into the minefield!” Emily ordered, then took a sharp breath when she looked at the battle display on the hologram.

The
Galway
had accelerated ahead of them, far ahead of them.

“
Galway
!” Emily called. “
Galway
! Watch your acceleration; you’re getting too far ahead of us.” But it was already too late.

On board the Dominion battleship
Vengeance,
Admiral Mello smiled in satisfaction. “Clever, but sloppy, eh?” he said to the unknown enemy commander. He had bet that the Vickies would try something new. He had held back, only firing his auxiliary battle lasers, but hoarding the primary lasers and all of his missiles. Now the
Vengeance
sat powered down, almost invisible, within easy shooting range of the emerging Vicky warships.