Homeworld (Odyssey One) (65 page)

Gracen glanced over, and then turned back to the president, who waved at her through the screens.

“Go. We’ll monitor from here.”

“Yes, sir.”

N.A.C.S.
ODYSSEY

“MOVE THOSE PALLETS!” Senior Chief Petty Officer Corrin growled to the big magnetic walker. “They’re firing the new guns dry and need the reloads.”

“Moving as fast as I can, Chief,” the crewman said, guiding the lumbering walker steadily through the hangar.

Corrin didn’t bother saying anything. She knew that he was doing just that, but there was no way she was going to say anything remotely “nice” until the fighting was over or they were about to die. Then she’d offer up either a
good job
or
it’s been an honor
, and not one damn whit more. There was a time and place for sweet talk, and the time was when she was drunk while the place was the privacy of her bedroom.

The loader stomped steadily toward the upper deck where the new long guns had been installed, leaving her to stalk around the hangar bay and look for any other infractions about which she could scowl.

I do like these mag boots in a crisis. Makes for a real intimidating look, what with me having to literally stomp around like I’m pissed off all the time.

The only thing missing from her personal image of the perfect CPO was a smoldering cigar in her teeth. Unfortunately she wasn’t nearly stocky enough to pull off that look, and cigars were class B contraband on spacecraft. Damned things fouled up the air system.

More’s the pity.

Corrin spotted another loader shifting a pallet of food stores out into the middle of the hangar so it could get to the munitions behind and her eyes lit up.

“Hey! Don’t leave this shit in the middle of the damn hangar!” she yelled. “You’re blocking the cat launcher!”

On the bridge, the lack of munitions was becoming a problem for the firing schedule, and Eric was just short of gnawing on the furniture out of frustration.

“How long to get the pallets shifted from the hangars?” he asked, irritated.

“A few more minutes, Captain.”

“Helm, bring us about. I want full power to the laser capacitors, and make sure that the pulse capacitors are charged as well,” he ordered. “If we give those close ships a few minutes, we’ll be charbroiled on the spot.”

To say nothing of what would happen to the
Weifang
if someone doesn’t cover them.

The Chinese ship was still firing off missiles even as the two Marauder class ships towed her out of the fight. It was an act that, while admirable, was attracting all kinds of the wrong attention from the Drasin ships that survived the initial barrage.

The only thing that had kept them alive to this point, in all honesty, was the fact that the
Weifang
’s initial explosive arrival
had carved out a hole the size of a gas giant right through the center of the alien formation and all that was left were flankers in the immediate vicinity.

“Contact the
Posdan
. Ask if they and the
Nept
can provide cover,” he demanded. “Or, better yet, if they can tow the ship out any faster.”

“Aye, aye, sir,” Winger said. “On it.”

“Waters, weapons are
free
. Do not let them get their feet back under them.” He turned his attention back to the tactical station. “Hammer them with everything we’ve got!”

“You got it, sir.”

A low end whine, almost inaudible, sounded through the bridge. Eric knew that it was the discharging of the laser capacitors being conducted through the hull metal. He pushed the sound aside, though it set his teeth on edge. The plot was showing three Drasin ships near enough to be considered within the knife range of unguided sub-light munitions, and the augmented display lit up the path of the laser as it reached out and sliced the closest of those in half.

It would be three seconds before the light of the explosion got back to them, but they weren’t in any position to wait for the fireworks show.

Lieutenant Commander Daniels, having assumed the helm from his trainee when the battle turned hot, guided the big ship around in a tight spin that brought her main armaments to bear on the closest threats. Beside him, Waters’s fingers were flying over his computer controls as he tried to stay two steps ahead of both Daniels and the enemy themselves, while locking in firing solutions with furious speed.

“Torpedoes away!” Waters called. “New solution to your board, Dan.”

“Got it. Making adjustments now. Look lively. Here they come!”

“Fighters in the sky!” Winger announced suddenly from across the room. “Multiple launches, we’ve got…I don’t know how many. System cannot get a count!”

“Oh, crap.” Eric pursed his lips, disgusted with what he was seeing.

Literally enough alien fighters to overload the
Odyssey
’s scanners were pouring out of the surviving ships, probably intended to be used as an ablative defense screen if he knew anything about the way the Drasin fought. Whatever the fighters were intended to be used for, they were certainly going to make it hard to shoot through.

“Scramble the Archangels, tell the
Enterprise
….”

“
Enterprise
has deployed fighters!”

Eric shrugged. “Or, you know, not.”

“Captain Carrow was a carrier commander through most of the last war,” Roberts reminded him. “He’ll lean on his birds almost as much as you lean on the Angels.”

“More than, I’d say,” Eric corrected, eyeing the plot balefully. “He has enough of them to constitute more than a minor scout force.”

“There is that, sir.”

Two entire flight wings were already pouring from the flight decks of the
Big E
, armed to the teeth and spoiling for a fight. Eric wished them well, but knew that they were even more outnumbered than the capital ships were.

“The Drasin forces are filling the gap and starting to press forward, sir,” Winger announced.

“Signal the others,” he said. “Fall back to the secondary line.”

The order went out and the big ships began to pull back, firing off their last salvos as their fighters provided a screen against kamikaze runs by their alien counterparts.

Jupiter was looming in the distance, but that was behind them now.

Ahead lay the next line of defense for the Sol System, the fourth world, the red planet.

Mars.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

THE SHIP MINDS were staggered. There were really no other words that could describe their current state, yet even that paled in insignificance to the way they felt. In a matter of moments they’d lost more than a third of their forces, and with even less warning than the previous losses.