Rust Bucket (8 page)

      Our ship was still cut off from our port, but at least the odds were better. It was then only five to one. The aliens were still in hot pursuit, but we were out of range. That was when I was called back to the bridge.

      "Well, we've done something I guess, but how do we get out of this?" the acting Captain asked.

      I replied, "We don't for the time being. We take them on a merry chase through this solar system and look for opportunities to chip away at them. If we can manage to get two more of them off our tail, then we should attack."

      "Attack three of them? Are you crazy?" he asked.

      I answered, "Not at all. Our gunners are good enough to take out one or two of them on the first pass. By then, they'll be so frightened of us, we'll be chasing them."

      "What kind of opportunities are we looking for?" he asked.

      I said, "Anything that looks dangerous. Find an asteroid field or a comet tail and we'll make them wish they'd never seen us before. Just tell me when one of the pilots spots something he considers dangerous. I'll give you my suggestions then. If you don't like them, you can always ignore them, especially since we're out of range."

      He considered what I said, then nodded before waving me away. For my own part, I was glad that those conversations were taking place on the bridge where they were continually recorded. If nothing else, I made sure that the recorders were always functioning on the bridge. After all, Frank wasn't always on duty.

***

It was about six hours later when I was called to the bridge and told that we were approaching an asteroid field picked up on our long range sensors.

      I said, "Good! Have Frank take over as pilot. He'll know how to handle this from the pilot's seat of responsibility. Have your other pilots observe him so that they'll know how to use this in the future. I'll put on the best gunners. With luck, we'll take out two, maybe three, of the enemy ships. Then we'll go after them and chase them back to where they belong."

      "Are you sure?" he asked with a very frightened look on his face.

      I replied, "I'm sure that we're not going to survive unless we take them out. Sooner or later, they'll wise up and call for reinforcements to cut us off and surround us. We either take them out now or face even more of them later."

      I guess my last statement convinced him. As with the other officers before him, he wasn't thinking things through. The enemy was only winning when they got the odds in their favor. Here we were, easy to get odds against. Our captain wasn't thinking about the fact that the enemy had reinforcements closer than we did. The acting Captain called for Frank to take over and the other pilots to gather round. I left the bridge and started putting the best gunners on every gun station. I called back to the bridge about two minutes later to let Frank know that we were ready. Our gunners were briefed on what to do. Hopefully, we could convince the enemy that we had taken hits and half our weapons were out of action. Then when we presented the inactive side, I expected the enemy ships to flock close to that side and we'd then give them a surprise.

      We approached the asteroid field and changed course so that we weren't going into it. Instead, we were staying on the edge of it with only one side of our ship facing all five enemy ships. No matter what happened, Frank maneuvered so that the same guns were always in firing position against the enemy until we convinced them that we were hurt. With our turning maneuver, the enemy was able to change course and cut down the gap between us and them so that both sides were more or less just within effective firing range again. Frank started his maneuvers while we kept up a steady rate of fire. He looped and shifted sideways, jinking the ship but always keeping the same one side of the ship facing the enemy. We must have kept that up for almost five minutes before we reached a point that Frank judged was just right to make it appear like we had to leave our position or be destroyed by the asteroids.

      Frank announced over the speakers, "Leaving the asteroids. Enemy ships taking up pursuit. Be ready on command to open up with everything."

      We all waited for the enemy ships to get into position on our supposedly blind side while two of them tried to keep us busy on our good side at very long range. Frank waited until the other three ships were tightly together, then hit the reverse thrusters so that we suddenly dropped speed. We came alongside the three enemy ships with our bad side blazing away at them before they were quite ready. It was almost impossible for us to miss as they were in tight together and unable to maneuver without colliding into each other. Only one of them was able to turn away as we successfully destroyed one target and saw the other suffer heavy damage from the debris and our firepower. By then, the other two ships were trying to close the gap now that we had attacked. We dropped speed again, creating an angle of fire for them that let some of their own shots hit on the damaged enemy vessel to complete the job of destroying it.

      We, on the other hand, weren't idle. We took advantage of our new position behind the enemy to cross the 'T', as the old sailing ships of Earth used to do, right behind the engines of the two approaching enemy vessels. We managed to give them both hot enemas, leaving them both disabled in space without engine power. With them unable to maneuver, the remaining undamaged enemy ship took off suddenly as it realized that the battle was even. We recrossed the 'T' behind the two disabled vessels, pummeling them with more fire, highly accurate fire since we didn't have to do any evasive maneuvers because they couldn't hit us back. One enemy ship ruptured from stern to bow and the other went silent completely as our shots skewered both ships, depriving them of an atmosphere.

      Then Frank took up the chase on the escaping vessel that made the mistake of running in the direction we wanted to go ourselves, namely towards our port, though we were several days away from it. We had slightly more speed than the enemy vessel had, probably due to better maintenance and the few hits we managed to get on the other ship before it pulled away. Even with our better speed, we weren't catching up to it easily. It was going to be a long chase, I could see. I started letting some of the other gunners take the positions for awhile so that our best gunners could get some rest. I went up to the bridge where the sudden change in our situation had become infectious among everyone there. They were urging the scheduled pilot, who had just relieved Frank of the controls, to do his best to catch up to the last enemy ship. I stood beside the acting Captain who actually smiled for the first time and put his hand on my shoulder in a friendly manner.

      "You were right. We could take them. Will we catch this one?" he asked, no longer afraid.

      I said, "I'd like to see us make it a clean sweep. If we do, then that's one less trick that the enemy will know how to do. Frank, what do you think he'll try to do? Slingshot around a planet?"

      Frank answered, "Yeah, Dave. You thinking about doing it from the other side?"

      "Why not? It works real well on pirates. These aliens aren't any better. Just more of them is all or there were a while ago," I said, getting a lot of smiles from others on the bridge who overheard my comment.

      Frank went over to the pilots and explained the maneuver so that when the enemy ship tried to pull it, whichever of our pilots was at the controls would know what to do. I left the bridge and notified all the gunners about what to expect, reminding them to start shooting the moment they saw the enemy ship in range, no matter what gun station they had.

***

About an hour later, Frank spoke over the communications and said, "He's trying to slingshot away. Get ready, folks!"

      I watched as the man handling my gun station looked back at me as if to give it up. I shook my head and said, "No, you need to have some fun, too. I'll watch."

      He smiled and turned his attention to watching for the enemy ship. We cut across on the other side of the planet and caught the enemy as he was about to slingshot away with greater speed than he otherwise would have been able to manage. I watched with pride as the man I told to have fun managed to hit the enemy vessel squarely on the third shot and watched it rupture suddenly.

      The pilot moved us around the dead enemy hulk and back onto a course for our home port.

      I reported back to the bridge and caught a round of applause from the acting Captain and the rest of the bridge personnel. I felt embarrassed for a moment and quickly recovered with, "Hey, guys! Don't forget, it was a team thing. In fact, I didn't even shoot that last ship. That was one of the gunners from the
Avenger."
I then walked over to the acting Captain and asked, "Well, what now? You want to go hunting or return to port?"

      For the first time, there was actually some enthusiasm in his face as he contemplated his options. We were successful, no matter that we had lost two ships and left one on another planet. We had accumulated nine kills for the two destroyed ships. That was better than any previous outing. Of course, I knew in the back of my mind that I would probably face a disciplinary proceeding when we got back. I wasn't too anxious to return, even though I knew we couldn't stay out too long with more people on board than we were meant to handle. Unfortunately, I could see that he realized that we had personnel who needed to be returned to port for reassignment, even if we were making good use of them. Plus, some of them were wounded. They really needed better attention than our on board surgeon was giving them.

      "I think we better get back to port before we run out of supplies, not that it hasn't been great kicking butt for a change. Navigator, plot a course for home and pass it on to the pilot. Set course as soon as you have the information. So, Dave, is that what you prefer to be called?" he asked.

      I answered, "It's just an old habit among some of us who used to run this ship for Pennyweight Shipping. Sometimes it's just handier to call someone by whatever lets you know that you can rely on him and vice versa. Other times, it's whatever is quickest to get someone's attention."

      He replied, "I see. You and your people got anymore tricks up your sleeves?"

      I answered, "We might. Mostly, it depends on the situation. We're used to being in situations where we don't have a whole squadron to support us and we have to protect a convoy. Of course, protecting a damaged ship is another thing entirely since it can't maneuver out of the way in an emergency. I wish we could take the other ship back, but it's probably in too deep for easy removal. Besides, I've heard from some of the crew that it was worse off than reported."

      He said, "Really? I'll have to look into that. Anyway, I'll try to support you when the Squadron Commander is taken ashore. I'm sure when he comes out of sedation, he'll likely press charges. But I think that our results will figure handily in your defense."

      I replied, "Thanks, Captain. I appreciate that."

***

I didn't expect him to live up to his word and I was right. When we arrived and the Squadron Commander was taken ashore, it didn't take more than an hour for the Shore Patrol to come to the
Thurman
to escort me off.

      When the trial started the next day, the charges were that I had removed the Squadron Commander from his position and put the acting Captain in charge. I beat those charges handily partly by wearing my decorations on my uniform when I appeared in front of the court and, more importantly, by having Frank pick up the appropriate video tapes from the bridge recorder and entering them into evidence. Those, along with the combat videos, showed that I was busy fighting and not running the ship or any conspiracy.

      Instead of me spending time in the stockade, the Squadron Commander was forced to resign as being physically unfit. The acting Captain was charged with perjury among other things. He spent the rest of the war in the stockade instead. Had any of the regular Navy officers taken the time to learn about the ship they were assigned to, they might have learned about the bridge recorders on the
Thurman
that weren't standard equipment on Navy vessels.

The combat videos provided an insight to others that I wasn't aware of until just before the
Thurman
was ready to leave port. That's when we received special orders while I was promoted to Lieutenant and made acting Captain of the
Thurman,
again. I looked at the special orders and grinned when I called my crew together and informed them all of our mission. I said, "Well folks, we've been given permission to search out the enemy wherever we can find him and take him on as we see fit. We're fighting alone and we'll have some extra equipment arriving along with a few extra gunners just so we can do our best."

      Frank came over and said quietly, "At least someone in the Navy knows how to use something that works."

      I nodded in quiet agreement as we checked out the
Thurman
from top to bottom to be sure that we were ready. For the first time in the war, I wasn't in charge of just the hydroponics and the guns. I was then responsible for everything, no matter how great or small. If nothing else, I had excellent mentors while at Pennyweight to emulate as I went about my duties. Before we lifted off from port, I informed the Port Commander of my intentions to hold a drill in orbit before departing into deep space. I didn't want them to launch an attack against us when we blasted away with our guns.

***

When we reached orbit, we spent three hours going through drills and teaching the regular Navy personnel the difference between the Navy way and the Pennyweight way. Since we were on our own, there was no need for us to be slow on the draw. We weren't likely to be endangering any other vessels because of our fire, at least not any that we were worried about. We cut the time for responding to "battle stations" in half using the same method the company used of preparing the men and women by making them find their way to their stations from the most inaccessible locations possible.