Black Legion: Gates of Cilicia (8 page)

No, it can’t be. The station can’t take that kind of beating.

Over thirty heavy ships were lined up and firing thick energy beams into the station. Each impact sent a shimmer around the station as its heavy shielding tried to absorb the energy.

They’re trying to bring down the rest of the shields,
he thought.

Changing to the feeds on the shuttle, he spotted many ships engaged in a battle that was so large he could barely understand it. The Armada was being hit hard, and the terrible thing was that the enemy fleet was no larger than theirs.

We’ve been caught with our pants down this time.
He nodded to himself.

The only thing he could think of was that it must have been the arrogance of the commanders and their position. He had been told many times in the last week about how safe they were safe in the Nebulae. It was either that, or the enemy had found a way to cripple the fleet prior to their arrival. All he could tell so far was that less than ten percent of the Armada was engaged in the fight. The rest of the ships were moored around the station and under attack. He remembered his studies and especially the ancient Terran officer Frederick Lanchester, quickly applying the rules the officer had devised to the facts as he could see them.

Lanchester had devised a simple set of rules for calculating the relative strengths of a predator/prey pair. This formula essentially required the squaring of the statistical number of forces on both sides. A simple deduction between the two values would show the winner and loser. Most officers found the concept hard to grasp, but Xenophon, with his years of philosophical and mathematical training, had found it easy. If five ships fought three ships, then Lanchester’s Law would state the comparative strengths were twenty-five versus nine. Therefore, the larger force would overwhelm the smaller forcer by almost a factor of three, and essentially a guaranteed victory with minimal losses.

 
“Lieutenant,” he called out to Lieutenant Devereux who sat just two seats away from him. She seemed to be ignoring him. He leaned towards her and called again. Rather than a reply, the side of the shuttle tore open to reveal the great emptiness of space. He felt the tug on his thick harness as the vessel instantly depressurised. Two of the seats ripped from their slightly damaged mounts and blasted out into space. Xenophon watched the two people vanish into the blackness. They were both wearing sealed suits.

That won’t help them.
He knew it would be almost impossible to find a couple of spacesuits amongst the debris and wreckage drifting around the station. The rush of air as the pressure altered was over almost as soon as it had started. Through the breach, a series of coloured lights betrayed the position of at least two ships.
 
The pilot of the shuttle must have made a drastic course change as the lights vanished to be replaced by an Alliance battleship.

“Gods!” he spurted out before thinking.

The mighty ship was burning from bow to stern as explosions and flashes ran the length of the vessel. A bright red beam move from the right until it made contact with the hull. As soon as the two touched, a bright light almost blinded him. If it weren’t for the automatic visor on his suit, he wouldn’t have seen anything at all.

A cutter, they’ve had it.

The common nickname for the heavy laser weapons, a cutter was designed to do exactly as its name suggested. It would make contact with the exterior of a ship and simply burn through, cutting an arc in the vessel. As he watched, the beam slashed through the ship as though it had been no more than soft plastic.

“Xenophon!” came the familiar voice of Lieutenant Devereux. He spun around to see the survivors of the shuttle trying to help two of the crew that had refused to wear suits. He moved to unbuckle himself, but a blast of power from the shuttle forced him into his seat.

“Hold on, we’ve making an emergency landing on the Valiant,” said a voice over the intercom system. Xenophon assumed it was the pilot, but in all the commotion he had no easy way to tell.

The impact was rough, and this time his straps gave way. Xenophon was thrown forwards and towards the front of the shuttle. With a crash, he struck an unconscious passenger. The shaking and violence of their trip suddenly stopped to be replaced by the harsh, full gravity of the warship. Xenophon hit his visor just in time to vomit onto the metallic floor. He coughed and then turned around to check on the others. Lieutenant Devereux was lying atop a number of crates that had broken free. Crew from the Valiant climbed in through the damaged hull and proceeded to pull them from the ruined shuttle. He climbed over to the officer and leaned down to her face. She was pale, but it looked like she was breathing.

“Get her out of here, she’s gonna blow,” called out one of the newly arrived crew.

He needed no more persuasion and grabbed her limp body. He expected her to feel light, but with the suit and webbing gear she was difficult to move. Pushing himself hard, he managed to bring her arm around his neck and across his shoulder. It took less than a dozen steps to reach the side doorway and out into the space of the hangar. Two men in full hazard suits pushed past him and blasted the burning electrical and fuel system with fire retardant foam and chemicals. He pushed on until reaching the rest of the crew who were trying to help a woman who had refused to wear a suit. Xenophon glanced at her, but as far as he could tell she was dead, probably from the explosive decompression that had already occurred. He was paranoid about suits during transportation on the small craft, and today had only reinforced that idea.

“Xenophon?” asked a feeble voice.

He looked down to see a weak smile from the Lieutenant. He smiled back and leaned in closer.

“How are you feeling?”

She coughed and shook a little.

“Not great, suit says it’s coming up with blood pressure warnings.”

Blood pressure? No, it must be internal bleeding.

He lifted himself up, so he was more visible to the crew.

“Hey, I’ve got a wounded officer here!”

A medical and an orderly were there in seconds. The medical officer attached a cable from his medical analysis tool on his belt. It connected directly into the biological monitoring package embedded into the suit.

“Yeah, she’s got internal bleeding, pressure dropping. Get her to sickbay, stat!”

The orderly called for another man to come and help and before Xenophon could say anymore, they were heading for the doors. Xenophon moved to follow but was stopped by the arrival of a gruff looking Commander. He was at least a head taller than Xenophon and scarred on the left side of his face.

“I’m down to fifty percent of my crew. Any of you with combat or targeting experience?”

Xenophon watched the Lieutenant disappear before looking back to the Commander. Five men had already stepped forward and were talking with him. He moved up to join them, and his heart pounded from the events he had already experienced.

“I’m a gunner.”

“What unit?” he replied suspiciously.

“Gamma Squadron, Sir.”

“Gamma huh? You guys pulled the bait mission, right? Yeah, you’ll do, come with me.”

The Commander moved away, and Xenophon stayed close. In the corridor, crew carrying equipment or moving the wounded continually interrupted them. Every few seconds, the heavy thud of pulse weapons striking the ship’s shields sent shivers down Xenophon’s spine. He was aware that powerful ships like the Valiant could take a number of hits but once the shields were down the weapons fire would start to burn or cut through the metal. It was that part of the attack that worried him.

“Sir, how are the shields?” he asked the man.

Without slowing down, the Commander threw him a quick reply.

“Don’t worry about the shields, son. She’s a tough old bird. Just come with me to the gundeck, I need you on the weapons and fast.”

Another ship and still they won’t tell me what the hell is going on.
He grumbled to himself.

The thuds of weapon impacts continued, and it was clear from the body language of the crew, they were flinching from the strikes just as much as him. As with his frigate, there were no windows in the vessel and the displays limited to the command sections of the ship. The small group entered a wider space, almost like a miniature plaza. Directly in front was a pair of large automated doors. The Commander stepped through and moved into the heart of the ship.

Wow, this is more like it,
thought Xenophon, for a moment forgetting about the apocalyptical battle that was taking place all around them. The first thing he noticed were the massive five-metre tall virtual windows that ran in a wide ring around the room. In the centre were almost two-dozen command officers. He looked at the windows and was presented with a terrible sight. The massive space station was being struck with powerful mass drivers. These electromagnetic weapons were able to hurl great chunks of material at super high speeds. Each strike blasted chunks of armour away and created a series of terrible breaches. What looked even worse was the incredible number of Laconian warships. He gave up counting after reaching thirty heavy ships, and there would be hundreds more cruisers and smaller. Beams and pulses of light hurtled towards the scores of docked ships, resulting in blasts and flashes as far as the eye could see.

“You, you’re a gunner, right?” asked a half-dressed Lieutenant.

“Uh, yes, frigate gunner.”

He considered his words for a short moment before indicating to a lower deck. Xenophon stepped towards it and noticed the rest of the group taking up their positions. It was much like the gundecks on the frigate, but there were only eight seats. He sat at the first available space and strapped himself in.

“Right, this is a Mark IV heavy laser setup. These are not cutters, and they fire in pulses, not too different to the frigate plasma weapons. Okay?”

Xenophon and the others nodded.

“Good. Your job is to help clear a path through the fighters and escorts as we break out.”

“What?” demanded one of the volunteers.

The Lieutenant didn’t need to explain any further as the amplified voice of the commander of the ship instantly drowned out his voice.

“I have just received a distress signal from Fort Plymouth. Laconian ground troops have boarded the base. This sector is lost, so the only question is, how much of a fleet we can escape with? In the meantime, a general evacuation has been ordered.
 
The Titan Prometheus is providing a rearguard for the rest of us. We are the last of the grand cruisers. Over sixty percent of the fleet is gone already. If we’re lucky, we’ll be leaving the Aegospotami Nebulae in one piece.”

As if to emphasis his point, a volley of plasma cannon rounds smashed into the heavy warship. The vessel shook slightly, but there were no other obvious signs of trouble. The Commander continued.

“Fighters are already in position to escort us out of here. Man your guns, and watch for pursuing ships. We get one shot at this. The jump beacon is seven minutes away, good luck!”

He checked the screen. It was similar to the model used on the frigates but with a handful of changes. The first was that he had no crew around him. The status indicator showed seventeen men in the weapons deck, but he simply queued up requests, and they would deal with them in sequence. It was a more automated but distant approach. He reasoned it must be because the larger weapons needed more crew and that they served more than just his guns. The end result was that only the more senior crew were present in this part of the ship.

Better than being with the rest of the midshipmen,
he thought wryly.

The second big change was that he controlled a battery of four separate turrets, each one equipped with quadruples heavy lasers. It was more firepower than all of the plasma cannons on his frigate put together. He tapped the connection button, and in a few seconds the communication node implanted in his skull connected to the fire system and communication network. He was immediately hit by a number of orders from the command crew.

“Cruiser unit blocking the beacon, right let’s sort them out then,” he said confidently though only to himself.

A quick scan of the gun system showed his systems were fully operational. The capacitors were charged and the guns set to short-ranged fire by default. As he watched the raging battle on the bank of screens, a number of diamond shapes appeared on the targets. He looked down but couldn’t find the fire control system.