Battleship Destroyer (103 page)

Jack just shook his head in disbelief.
"Number One, start dropping us back down toward the bottom of this trench. Maybe if we are lucky they both will be too busy to notice us sliding past under them even though we are lit up like a beacon."

The First Officer pointed the ship's tail up and gave them a good bit of thrust down into the trench. The Course Plot line dropped down to intercept the bottom corner of the trench a good two minutes away from the fighting spider ships.
The two ships continued to shoot the shit out of each other seemingly unaware of the approaching wall of the cloud. By the time the Red Pepper had dropped to the floor of the trench the battle was over with the relatively undamaged spider going in to capture the armored decks while a bunch of boats rushed over to the spider hulk. The looser started to climb out of the trench on only one engine. Jack made a few calculations in his head and knew he could not possible make it up and out in time. He was already dead and did not know it.

"Ok what is going on now Pan?"

"Now that the battle is over the victor is claiming his spoils. He will strip the other ship of anything he can use to strengthen his own ship and crew. The old commander's ship is well known for its large fearless Apes and competent maintenance slaves. If he can acquire additional Apes and slaves he can greatly increase his influence by stationing Apes or slaves on other ships or even use them to take other ships out right for more decks or resources on planets."

"Ok and what if he
loses the Apes he is sending over to take the other ship instead."

"You do not understand Captain Turner. The Captain has already won tittle to the other ship. All he has to do is take possession of the crew and
take the other Captain back to the swarm to be reassigned a new ship when production is started again."

"Well he is not going to take possession of much before they
plunge into the cloud."

"That may not be the case Captain Turner. Just wait and watch."

Jack frowned. "Ok. Let's at least try to keep them from escaping. Weapons, start firing missiles as fast as you can reload. At this speed they should have no problem penetrating. Target the base of their weapons and engine discharge cones and arms. Pan, how long until you have your gas recovered from one gun in each turret so I can fire them?"

"Another minute
Captain Turner."

"Good. Weapons, how long will it take to recharge both capacitors in each turret if you have all 4 Engine generators as well?"

The Weapons officer turned to look at Jack for a second then back at his console for several seconds as his fingers flew over the board. "With the new generators from the aliens on line as well, about 10 seconds sir."

"Very well. Thank you Lieutenant." Jack stood up and walked to the front of the bridge watching the spider ship
approach to latch up to the shield decks. Jack closed his eyes for a few seconds then took a deep breath. "Number one let's pull a Spider trick and point our nose at the enemy. The nose has cooled down quite a bit and should make it harder for them to see our side radiators. It will also make targeting them easier as well as using the engines if we need to maneuver up off the floor of the trench. Weapons you can go active. Target their engines and then their weapons. We have to get them before they can finish and hide behind the dam shields. Hopefully they were damaged during their battle with the other spider ship."

"One light minute from target Sir
we will pass only some 5 light seconds below them." Came Tactical’s voice across an all too quiet bridge.

"
The spider ships do not have any sensors going. They are dead to the universe. That does not make sense." The Ensign said.

Pan turned to the Ensign.
"They are using all their resources including the crew to strip the other ship. Under God Law they are safe from attack until they are finished.

"Well we have a captive target that can't move even if we are almost a light minute away. Pan how long
until you have the gas pumped out woman?"

"Another ten seconds Captain."

"Engineering, maximum power on the engine generators and send the power to weapons. Weapons, how long until our missiles start hitting?"

"They should be hitting the target now Captain.
We will know in another 45 seconds sir."

"
"One Gun tube ready on all turrets Captain." Said the Gunnery Officer like a race horse from the starting paddock.

"Fire when ready weapons.
Hold additional missiles."

"Firing, 3, 2, Shoot! Range
41 light seconds sir."

Jack found himself holding his breath waiting for a report on
whether they had actually hit something.

"
Missile spread hitting target Sir.

"
Recon missile reporting sir. Torpedo hits on all three main targets from first spread. Two on the engine mounts of Bravo, 3 on target Alpha’s and 7 on target Echo." The recon missile transmitted view was up on the screen.

"Firing second sa
lvo, 3, 2, Shoot. 32 light seconds to target sir." Said the Weapons Officer.

"
Can you tell what damage was done to target Echo Ensign?"

"Not yet sir. Missiles
detonated inside the hull. Target has not moved. Or attempted to move yet. It is probably still hooking up to the shield decks."

"Firing guns, 3
, 2, Shoot." 24 seconds to target."

The screen suddenly saw the spiders start
to sprout short range weapons fire as 12 missiles of the second wave swarmed at the ships. Ten got through with 7 on Echo and 3 on Alpha. All of them disappearing inside the ships again. Then a second later 6 beams streaked into Echo making solid hits.

"
Gun hits on target Echo, recon torp shows 4 hits, two misses." Said Tactical.

"Third wave of
missiles hitting target sir."

"Guns firing, 3
, 2, Shoot. 16 light seconds to target."

The screen showed all 12
missiles hitting Target Echo around the engines with only a few guns trying to take them out.

"Guns firing, 3
, 2, Shoot. 8 seconds to target" With the enemy quickly climbing above them at only light seconds away, Jack swore he could see the beams streak up to hit the targets engines. Then 2 beams streaked down to hit the cloud off to the side of the Red Pepper.

"They targeted our
reflection Jack." The Ensign practically yelled."

"I should have t
hrown another salvo of missiles at them." Jack grimaced. "Too late now.  They would never be able to slow down enough to hit them if they fired any more missiles now. But then if 36 is not enough then 12 more probably would not have made a difference. Ensign how is the interference. Can they call home?"

"Firing guns, 3,
2, Shoot.”

“Hits Captain. Doing damage assessments now.”

"I don't think they will get the chance before they hit the cloud sir."

"Firing guns, 3
, 2, Shoot. Six seconds to target."

There was nothing to do but wait as Jack sat back. It would be another 45 seconds at least before the Spiders could shoot again. Four more
gun salvos would hopefully put paid to them.  "Ensign any sign of them having any propulsion?"

Target Echo suddenly parted from all 9 shield decks and not just the 7 it was trying to salvage as a beam shot from the hulk of target Alpha cutting an engine in half just as it came alive pushing the ship away from the armored decks up toward safety. Target Echo was suddenly drifting in formation with target Alpha and slowly tumbling.

"They think the other ship is attacking them." The Ensign said surprised.

“Four
seconds to target."

"Enough Gunner. We don't need a running count anymore." The recon torpedo continued showing hits about every 8 seconds.

“Passing closest approach now Captain.”

The beams were too close to see more than a flash hitting the enemy ship as they started to pull away.

At a full minute from what did not even look like spider ships anymore Jack ordered them to cease firing. "I think we are done with target practice gentlemen. Time to check the guns for wear on our new liners before they blow up. Engineering you can power up the engines again. We will be going to cruise thrust as soon as you are ready. Number one, maintain course and normal cruise thrust. Let's keep the Admiral happy at least until the spiders hit the wall.

They watched the last laser streaks rip into the two
hulks as they passed almost 2 light minutes from the enemy. "I can't believe we dodged that bullet. All the Spider fleet needed was one FTL call from these assholes."

"Jack!
Small boat leaving target Alpha. No, it’s too fast. Accelerating at 200 Gee's sir. Must be a currier ship. Course straight toward the Spider Fleet. Should arrive in about two hour sir."

"Captain
, permission to throttle up to max thrust." The First Officer turned around to Jack hopefully.

Jack shook
his head frowning. "No, maintain the old maximum acceleration Number One for now."  Closing his eyes for a second. "You said a couple hours. Well, no sense in getting in a hurry about calling the Admiral.

"Permission to fire Captain! Tracking it." The Weapons Officer said.

Jack watched the Courier changing course every few seconds to make targeting them impossible at the range they were at and shook his head again. "No, the chances of actually hitting it is slim." Standing up Jack headed for the hatch. "Number One, you have the conn. Call me when the currier is out of sight and get us out in the middle of the trench."

Stopping at the hatch
, Jack shook his head again as he looked down at the deck resigning himself to doing something he hated. Wishing he did not have to. "Aa Comm, Ship wide address." Then after the attention getting whistle.  "This is the Captain. We have dodged several bullets over the last few hours but we are not home yet. A currier managed to escape when I ceased fire when I thought the enemy was no longer a threat which means we may have to deal with the enemy fleet later but as of now we do not know for sure. For those who care you can watch our latest target hulks hit the cloud in about a minute on your screens. Feel free to access the none restricted battle recordings at your leisure. Every kill and maneuver we have made would not have been successful without all of you doing your very best and I just wanted to congratulate you all on such fine work.  I am honored to have each and every one of you as part of my crew. But remember we still have a long way to go and a hard job ahead. Keep up the good work. Captain out." Feeling like a fool but knowing that if he had not talked to the crew, especially after they had won a significant skirmish. Most of his crew would have dropped out to celebrate or eat or something, leaving him with mostly a bot crew and the prospect of losing the main battle. At least that was how it worked in The Game.

Jack left the bridge. If he did not take a walk (even though he wanted to run) and get rid of some of the energy rushing
through him, he would burst or start screaming. He soon found himself all the way forward looking for someplace isolated and wound up inside the ship's most damaged sections.  Sections that had cost the ship so much of its original crew. Holding onto the jagged lip of a hole blasted in the hull, he watched the cloud drifting past as the ship tried to slow down at what was feeling more and more like a snail's pace of only 300 Gees'. A pace that would get them killed now that a currier was headed back to warn the enemy fleet. Telling them that they were still alive and able to kick butt."

"Captain Turner, this is Commander Picket. The Spider Currier has
disappeared over the rim of the trench. Did you want to call the Admiral and brief him?"

Jack turned from
the sight outside the ship to inspecting the compartment only to come across a body wedged in the corner. "No Number One. Not yet. No sense in letting them know we are here before that currier tells them. We are either home free or not. This trench ends in another 12 hours at the rat we are decelerating. We will skim up at the end and take a look around, call the Admiral then and hope the Spider fleet is taking their time and we have out ran them. If we haven't there is nothing we can do about it right now. Put the ship on condition 2 and get everyone fed, bedded and some semblance of normalcy going for now."

"I am sorry Sir but we are only 6 hours from the end of this trench at
our deceleration of…"

"Number One
; I am sure that we are decelerating at a rate that will give us at least 12 hours before we reach the end of the trench. My biggest worry is that we stay low enough not to be detected.  Now just quit dawdling along and get me at least 12 hours Number One or do I need to put someone on the helm that is not afraid of a few gas atoms in this trench. I am busy in the forward damaged sections of the bow.  It is a mess up here. Captain out."

Jack
turned back around to stand at the edge of the hole blasted in the side of the ship again, hanging onto a stanchion as the trench below and to the sides slowly slid up past as the engines worked hard slowing them down. The Gee meter in his Command Suit slowly rose to a thousand Gees. He knew it must be a figment of his imagination but he felt like he could see the speed of the ship passing over the clouds actually start slowing down. He felt his spirits pick up as hope of getting out of this mess started seeping back into him.