Alarm of War (53 page)

“Six cruisers, Admiral, but they are two to three hours behind us.”

“Just so,” Kaeser sighed. He ran his hand through his hair, feverishly calculating the number of hulls available and the throw weights they represented. God damn Mello to hell for eternity and a day for squandering his forces to break through the minefield! Mello spent his entire career treating every problem like a nail and himself the hammer. And now this.

Whine or lead, Admiral,
Kaeser chided himself.
Which will it be?

“What are you going to do, Fritz?” he asked softly.

“I don’t know!” Bauer blurted. “I-I think Admiral Mello is going to get us all killed, but if we don’t try, the space station Atlas will escape. But if we are all destroyed and it does escape, then who will be left to protect Timor and the rest of the Dominion? And if I do the wrong thing, DSD will arrest my family…” He stopped, breathing hard, his face fluid with mixed emotions of doubt, fear and shame. “I don’t know what to do, sir. I honestly don’t.”

Kaeser stood and buttoned up his uniform tunic. “Fritz,” he said kindly. “I think it would be best if you and I went back to the bridge together.”

Relief showed on Bauer’s face. “What are you going to do, sir?”

Kaeser smiled ruefully. “I don’t know yet, Fritz, but when the time is right, I’ll do it.”

• • • • •

The H.M.S.
New Zealand
reached the inner edge of the minefield. Space Station Atlas was a mere sixty minutes away at a high speed run, visible now on passive sensors. In fact, it was as stealthy as a bonfire in a dark room.

Worse, there was still no sign of Admiral Douthat and the rest of the Home Fleet.

“Send a courier drone to the Atlas, Alex,” Emily said. “Let them know we’re here and we are preparing to attack the Dominion ships as they come through the minefield. Tell them if they have any ships available, we urgently need reinforcements.”

The
Kent
and the
Yorkshire
called in that they were on station. Emily had Merlin project the point where the Dominions were most likely to break through the minefield, then ordered the other ships to use their tractor beams to move nearby missile mines to that area. For the fifth time, she obsessively reviewed their weapons inventory and came to the same conclusion: they might get lucky and take out one more Duck cruiser, but that was it. The rest of the cruisers and that gargantuan Dominion battleship were going to break through and reach the Atlas. Her battered ships just didn’t have the firepower to stop them.

An idea struck her then, but it was so dark and repulsive she didn’t want to consider it. She certainly didn’t want to say it out loud in front of her Bridge crew.

“Minefield breach imminent!” Merlin announced.

“All ships, go to battle stations!” Emily ordered, working to keep her voice calm. “Merlin will identify the target. Fire all lasers and missiles on my order.”

On the battle display, she watched as the last line of missile mines blinked rapidly and disappeared. Then there was the telltale red symbol of an enemy ship emerging into open space.

“Mine field has been breached,” Merlin said solemnly. “Enemy missile cruiser is emerging.”

Gods of Our Mothers, help us now
, Emily thought. She thumbed the comm button. “All weapons, fire! Fire!”

On the Dominion battleship
Vengeance
, Cookie peeked cautiously around one corner. Nothing. There was a large sign on the far wall with an arrow pointing to the left. She turned to her troops. “Anybody read Dominion?”

A private held up his hand. “I do, Sergeant. Lived on Timor for a year with my grandparents and learned it pretty good, I guess.”

“Get up here,” she hissed. He trotted up and she saw his name tag read “Albert Meyer.” “Can you read that sign, Meyer?” She pointed to the end of the corridor. He peeked around, then pulled back.

“Says the Combat Command Center is down there to the left,” he reported.

“That sound like the Bridge to you?”

He nodded. “Actually, the Bridge on a Dominion ship is just used for docking and stuff like that. The CCC is where they control the ship when they’re in a battle. That’s what we want, Sarge.”

Cookie looked back. She had about thirty men, all armed with either Tilleke air guns or captured blasters from the Ducks. Many of the Savak air guns had run out of ammo or air, and most of the captured blasters were getting low as well. Wisnioswski still carried a spear; his ‘lucky charm,’ he called it. She had lost about half of her force, but had just teamed up with the survivors from another. There was some pretty heavy fighting going on behind them, and the sounds of gunfire were steadily moving closer.

Time to move.

“The room we want is just up ahead,” she whispered to the others. “Once we get in, shoot everybody you see, got it? That’s why we’re here, to take out the people in that room.”

Everybody nodded. Some looked scared, some excited, some like they just wanted to finish it one way or another. Another deep vibration ran through the deck; the
Vengeance
had just fired its main batteries again.

“Let’s do it,” Cookie said.

The lasers and missiles from the
New Zealand, Yorkshire
and
Kent
smashed into the first Dominion cruiser. For a long moment nothing happened, then it seemed to physically swell, its hull plates bubbling like the skin of a frying sausage. Then rents tore through its hull in a dozen places, venting air and flame into space. The ship leaned slowly to one side, as if it were slowly losing its balance, and began a slow head-over-tail tumble.

Moments later, the second Dominion cruiser emerged, lasers and missiles firing as it came.

Emily’s battered little task force sat naked and helpless. It would take a few minutes to reload their missile tubes – the ones that still worked – and their lasers had empty capacitors. “Chaff and decoys!” she ordered, then hit the comm button to connect her to Skiffington and Stein.

“Get back into the minefield!” she said crisply, tucking her trembling hand back under her thigh and sitting on it. She paused, closing her eyes. Run or fight?
If I run, the Ducks will be all over Atlas
in minutes. But fight with what? Nothing left but three battered hulls.
She wanted to weep, but forced herself to speak calmly.

“The big Dominion battleship is going to come through any minute. I want you to evacuate all nonessential personnel. If a weapon is not functional, send that crew off as well. Put them in shuttles and send them to Atlas.”

Grant Skiffington and Lissa Stein exchanged a look. She knew what they were thinking: first she fired her Omega drones, now she was evacuating crew.

“Emily, listen-” Grant Skiffington began.

“When the big battleship starts to come through, we are going to ram it,” Emily said matter-of-factly, both of her shaking hands now tucked under her armpits. “All three of us. I’m pretty sure that the battleship is the one carrying the anti-matter missiles. If we can take that out, Atlas should be able to hold its own until Admiral Douthat arrives. Save as many of your crew as you can, but be ready in ten minutes.
New Zealand
out.” She punched the comm button.

Her bridge crew stared at her, open mouthed.

“I’m sorry,” she said softly. “But I need all of you to command the ship. Alex, designate the nonessential crew. If in doubt, send them to the shuttle bay. We can control most of the weapons from here.” The weapons didn’t really matter, she knew. They weren’t going to kill that big bastard ship with less than a dozen missiles; they were going to kill it by ramming it with three Victorian cruisers accelerating to full military speed.

The crew continued to stare at her, and her eyes fell on Tobias Partridge. He is so
young,
she thought. And what’s more, Partridge was assisting Chief Friedman, not in charge of the sensors himself. Alex Rudd was watching her from behind Partridge. He sensed what she was thinking and nodded, pointing at the young man.

Chief Gibson nodded as well. “He’s just a lad,” he said softly.

“Mr. Partridge,” she said, “Go to the shuttle bay and evacuate to Atlas. Quickly, if you please.” Partridge looked stricken, glancing at the two Chiefs and back to Emily. She said nothing. He stood abruptly, jaw clenched, then left without a word. As he left, Emily felt herself loosen a little.
At least I could save him.

On the Atlas, Queen Anne and Sir Henry sat in a small room, watching a duplicate battle hologram that showed the second Dominion cruiser emerging from the minefield.

“Why don’t they fire?” the Queen asked in frustration, referring to the three Victorian ships led by Emily Tuttle.

“I rather suspect that they are out of missiles,” Sir Henry said harshly. They had been arguing on and off for hours, with Sir Henry urging her to take a fast ship and leave for Refuge, and the Queen stubbornly refusing.

On the holo display, several small dots of light suddenly appeared, leaving the three Victorian cruisers and heading slowly towards Atlas. The Queen frowned, leaning forward to see more clearly.

“Are those courier drones?” she asked.

“No, Your Majesty,” said Hiram Brill from the doorway. “They’re shuttles. Captain Tuttle has ordered all nonessential crew to try to make it to the Atlas.”

Queen Anne looked at him in confusion. Sir Henry blanched, then cursed under his breath. Hiram nodded grimly. Anne glanced at Sir Henry, then back to Hiram. “What?” she asked, half perturbed, half alarmed.

“Emily has sent off the nonessential crew because she is preparing to ram the Dominion battleship, Majesty.”

“Oh,” said Anne Radcliff Mendoza Churchill, queen of all Victoria, in a very small voice.

Cookie peeked around the corner. There it was, the entrance to the Combat Control Center. With ten guards milling about in front of it. The actual entrance was probably thirty yards down the corridor. There were no side doors, no joining corridors. Once they rounded the corner and attacked, they would be exposed for the full thirty yards.

Nothing for it. Do, or die trying. She smiled, despite herself.
We’re havin’ fun now.

Behind them, the sounds of fighting grew louder. The Duck armored troops were getting closer. Runners had told her that three of the five armored troops had been killed, but the butcher’s bill among the Victorian Marines had been gruesomely high.

“Wisnioswski!” she whispered. In a moment, the big Marine was crouched beside her, pistol in one hand, spear in the other.

Cookie looked him full in the face. “Havin’ a good time, Wisnioswski?”

He smiled broadly and held up his spear. The shaft was red with blood almost its entire length. “Wouldn’t have missed this for the world, Sarge!”

Cookie leaned closer to him. “We’ve picked up about ten grenades from the dead Duck soldiers. Gather them up from our guys and bring them to me. Be quick about it!”

Wisnioswski grinned and nodded, then slid away, still brandishing his spear. It’s like having my own Polish Viking, she thought, bemused. And thank God for him.

On the H.M.S.
Lionheart,
Admiral Douthat sat and fumed. “Can’t you go any faster?” she asked harshly. They were still an hour away from Atlas and even further from the minefield where the fighting was taking place.

Captain Eder shook his head. “We are now at three gravities above full military acceleration. We have exceeded all of the safety limits. If we accelerate any harder the probability of failure goes to one hundred percent.”

Douthat muttered a curse.

A bridge officer handed Captain Eder a tablet. He glanced at it, then turned to Douthat. “The Ducks have broken through the minefield. Several cruisers and a very large battleship. The last three ships of the Coldstream Guard are preparing to attack.”

The last
three
? Douthat winced. “And the Queen?” she asked.

“She refuses to leave the Atlas,” Eder replied.

“God dammit!” Douthat snarled. “Can’t this thing go any faster?”

Emily commed the
Kent
and
Yorkshire
. “Merlin estimates the Duck battleship will come through in about ten minutes, maybe fifteen. From the time we see it to the time we hit it, we’ll have about one minute to pile on as much speed as we can. Full military acceleration all the way.”

Stein looked at her sourly. “Who goes first?” she asked.

Emily smiled thinly. “This is the Navy, remember? We all go together.”

Grant Skiffington shook his head. “Emily, there has to be another way, something better than-”

“What?” Emily demanded. “Tell me another way to stop that damn battleship from getting through! Give me a bloody alternative and I’ll take it!”

Grant stared at her. He opened his mouth to say something, but then closed it. Emily turned to Stein. “Do
you
have a better option?”

Stein glowered, but said nothing.

Emily nodded. “Be ready in ten minutes. Switch your AI to ‘Max.’ And when I give the order, don’t do anything fancy. Straight in and ram the bastard.
New Zealand
out.”

Cookie wiped the sweat from her hands and primed the first grenade, then the second. She stepped out from the corner and threw them. Beside her Wisnioswski threw four more that he had taped together. They had four left, but she was saving them in case the armored Dominion soldiers caught up to them.

They jumped back.

BaaWHAM!!! The explosion jolted Cookie to her knees. Metal fragments pinged and ricocheted off the bulkhead. Screams and shrieks sounded from the corridor. “Get ‘em!” Cookie screamed and all thirty four of her soldiers dashed down the corridor, screaming and shooting as they ran.

But at least four of the Ducks were alive. Stunned and wounded, but still fighting. They sprayed the corridor with flechettes that cut a swath through the attackers. Two of the Royal Marines simply blew apart, chucks of flesh splattering wetly into the faces of the Marines behind them. Eight more screamed and fell, punctured by dozens of steel darts. Cookie’s troops opened fire in a raging fusillade, but their fire sputtered and died as one by one their air rifles ran out of ammunition or air.