Battleship Destroyer (104 page)

He
finally looked away from the canyon drifting up toward the bow of the ship like they were in one unbelievable long landing pattern to notice the butts of the huge Battleship guns laying against the ship's hull to each side of him. The gun tube folded into the extension arms reaching along their sides down the hull to the hinges on the mounting base cylinders slid into the side of the ship's original 4th gundeck. A gundeck that had been simply left empty when it was decided to make this hull into a fast tanker instead of a Battleship. The original gun mount holes in the hull had been enlarged to make room for the huge mounts simply because scabbing the gun onto the side of the ship would not have been enough to survive the strain of acceleration. His gaze dropped even farther down the hull to the enemy Assault Shuttle scabbed onto that side of the ship so far below.  He still could not believe after jumping over to the enemy Battleship in the hope of grabbing a few pieces of equipment and maybe a body or two in a quick raid so they would have some idea who they were fighting, that he had wound up coming away with his ship packed to the brim.

Shaking his head he turned back into the ship and started working his way around the gravity coil dead zones w
here the knocked out coils allowed the gravity to spike. Though luckily with the coils in the decks below and above the dead zones still active, the Gees never got above 30 or 40 Gees in those areas even though the ship was doing a thousand Gees. But still he had to make sure he went around the dead zones as he climbed through the wreckage looking for what he did not know as he passed bodies and wrecked equipment. His eyes showing him the devastation many decks and compartments away allowing him to go around the worst parts.

Jack
finally found himself at the captain's cabin. Surprisingly it was undamaged as he knew the bridge had taken a direct hit. Looking around he tried to figure out what kind of a man the old Captain had been. At first he was baffled finding few personal possessions around the cabin but finally realized that all the fancy polished brass and chrome and crystal and fancy decorations and pictures on the bulkhead of what must have been the Captain with important people Jack did not know told him a lot about the man. Then he found a family picture screen next to his bunk with different pictures coming up every few second of family and friends. Evidentially he had 2 boys and a girl with a beautiful wife in a fancy apartment on an orbital habitat with the earth out the bay windows. The tablet on his desk was still open with an unfinished letter to his wife. Jack read the first few lines telling her that he was glad that her and his kids were safe at home and that he was glad that he would be seeing them in a few weeks back at The Rock.

He could not make himself read any farther as he realized the Captain's family would never see the Captain again.

Taking a deep breath he left the death and destruction and over the next two hours he visited most of the rest of ship talking briefly to a lot of people without trying to get in their way while making decisions about who and what went where. Being polite when someone recognized him but firm that he did not have the time to say more than a few words right then. He was surprised how well the human and alien crews were getting along. He was even more surprised that the aliens were making themselves at home so rapidly and without complaining as they started to convert many of the tanks not newly filled with pillage and cargo into homes with what few possessions they had managed to bring.

After touring the ship and deciding things had settled down enough
Jack started assigning crews to go up and start going through the destroyed personnel and command decks at the nose of the ship.  To start work on opening up sections and start recovering bodies. A few aliens that wanted to know what they could do around the ship to help, Jack sent up as well to join them. Then later when coming out of one of the engine rooms he bumped into Pan in a section of the ship that had been packed with aliens when he went into the Engine room but was now empty, he could not help asking what had happened to them all.

"Every spare worker is up in the forward damaged sections of your ship Captain Turner looking for your dead and any survivors. Our engineers are already planning repairs to start as each section is cleared as you directed."

"I am sorry Pan but I do not remember giving such orders."

"You told several workers to join and help
as best as they could the crews in the damaged bow of the ship and they passed your orders along to the rest of us. We wish to thank you for putting such trust in us so soon after joining your crew Captain. We are trying our best to live up to your expectations." Pan bowed her head slightly. "Now that I have found you. Is there anything else we can help you with? We have more workers than can be efficiently used in the cramped space of the damaged bow at this time."

"Ah, no. N
ot that I know of at his time. Besides your people have been through a lot. Take some time to make yourselves at home and relax and recuperate. We will go over what needs done after everyone has had time to settle in. Let's set up a meeting tomorrow and we will see what we can come up with that needs to be done." Jack patted her on the shoulder like he had seen his father do hundreds of times to crewmen that had done a good job.

The Ensign came into the compartment and made a beeline toward Jack.
“There you are. You look like shit but then I have been hearing about you all over the ship. Time for you to eat and sleep before you drop." Grabbing his arm she pulled him along as she smiled at Pan. "Later Darling, you can have him back after he has had some rest and a good shower."

Jack walked onto the bridge to "Captain on the bridge."

Taking the Command Chair he turned to look around the bridge.
It looked like The Games Bridge but now the crew were more than just a bunch of constructs or avatars. These were real living crewmen and a ship full of living souls.

"Lights 20 %." The Ensign said from the Sensor/Science console.
"The fusion trap was tripped 3 hours ago according to the neutron serge we got then. We have no idea if it took any ships with it yet. The abandoned Republic hulk went about an hour later."

As the lights dimmed, Jack found himself sitting with the trench quickly
shallowing around him. The tail of the ship sending a stream of ions out to hit the rising floor of billowing clouds ahead. Studying the navigation plot line arcing up out of what now was little more than a valley. "Conn, back off to 300 Gee's please."

Jack's head started to
swim as the Gee's rapidly but smoothly reduced to 300. Reaching to his head he rubbed his temples until the ship settled in at 300. "That was different. How come I can feel the difference? Can't be good." Looking around the bridge, he noticed the Ensign looking at him smiling like she knew something he didn't. "Sensor's, you see anything yet?"

"Just coming above the
rim now sir.” The Ensign said smiling from ear to ear at Jack. “It will take a few minutes to run a long distance scan but nothing within the quick close scan of 6 light hours sir. But being a single simple armed tanker, they would have to be big and ugly and stupid for us to see them."

"Yes I know Ensi
gn so what are you smiling at?"

"You discovering a new sense for the first time and wonder
ing what the hell it is." Turning back to her board. "No sign of anything solid out to 6 hours but traces of Spider Engines beyond our range roughly dead astern of our course sir."

"Very well Ensign. Comm,
establish a Laser Comm with the fleet now we should be in line of sight, give the Admiral a call and tell him we are alive and well and see if their array has the range to tell us if our ass is clean or not."

A few minutes later the Comm Officer turned to Jack. "Captain, they do not
seem to be where we were expecting them to be. Permission to use a wide beacon cone to establish contact Sir?"

"Tactical
, any chance that a Spider ship is in that quadrant?"

"If it i
s sir.  The Fleet is screwed sir."

"Point well taken. Cone away Lieutenant."

They had a return FTL beam within seconds.

"
Captain it is about time. We wrote you off hours ago. Where are you?" The Admiral looked around off camera. "You are just coming out of that trench at this time? I told you not to use full thrust on your engines Captain." Looking back at the tactical tank. "But you were at the bottom of the trench out of sight and if they can't add, you may pull it off but then you are 10 hours from the enemy fleet now and they just may buy it. I will have to go over your reports but if you would have come out when you were supposed to, you would only have been a couple hours ahead of the enemy at most if that and the likely hood that you would be able to escape without using full thrust would be unlikely. The speed they got underway after the currier popped out of the trench tells me you must have added a couple more enemy ships to your kill total. Good going Ace." The Admiral smiled. You just may manage to lengthen your lead in the next couple of weeks allowing you to enter the cloud without being followed by the main fleet with the advanced enemy squadron headed for our slow damaged squadron you should have no problem."

"Ah Admiral, I hate to be difficult but according to my calculations the fleet will be running out of fuel long before you reach the cloud
and I don't see the resupply fleet on the tactical that we had planned. Now as a tanker, I don't have to worry about fuel even though I dumped all my tanks to hide behind. They don't know that and with empty tanks the old engines could easily do almost 400 gees and out run them even if I didn't have the rebuilt engines."

"Change of plans Captain.
The transports that delivered the strike cannot make it around in time without taking damage. Admiral Forester has decided not to risk it just for a ruse. I am just hoping the Spiders think we have a fleet of mostly tankers instead of transports. We will enter the cloud a good 15 hours ahead of the enemy fleet if they come for us. But the slow squadron is another story. They are too far behind and I am going to have to send them to a different entry point. It is one the enemy has already found by following and destroying a transport that entered there. I am not going to waste a good entry point as close as the enemy squadron is and then the fleet is going to be on their heels. Hopefully they will lose any tails in the cloud maze and make it to a check point bubble I will assign them before we enter the cloud." Looking down for a few seconds. "You on the other hand are a different matter. I am also sending you to an entry point already found and explored by the enemy so even with a head start you will have to get deep into the cloud in a hurry and then wait at the bubble for farther orders. A bubble the enemy already knows about after following a transport into and destroying it."

Jack just stared for a few second. "Why do
I have the feeling that I have just been screwed Admiral. You could set up a nice little trap for my tail over the next couple of weeks."

"Captain Turner, I am having a hard time even getting clearance to allow you into the cloud with your ship full of possible spy's. The Admiralty is not going to risk
giving the enemy anymore entry points. It is bad enough that we are probably going to lose 4 more transports when the enemy catches them."

"What the hell Admiral, it is our territory in our cloud and an entry point you pick
ed. Setting a trap would be easy and guaranty the transports got through." Jack looked at the Admiral with narrowing brows. "Ok what happened Admiral?"

The Admiral
frowned. "The frontier fleet went forward with the attack before their engines could be upgraded in spite of my and FleetComRock orders not too.  Luckily the enemy did not pursue the survivors but almost half the fleet was lost according to latest figures. We are hopping more will show up eventually. Most of the survivors are damaged as it is. They are abandoning the outer frontier systems now." The Admiral wiped her eyes as she bit her lip and then grimaced. "You destroyed more ships in your little engagements than the entire fleet damaged in the full out battle." Sitting back in her chair. "Command has made you a hero on the home planets already while hiding the defeat as best they can calling it a skirmish instead of the all-out battle it was." Shaking her head. "Only thing is they are afraid to commit any ships to any battle until they figure out what went wrong even to rescue you. Afraid of their own shadows. They figure you the hero can rescue yourself. You are on your own even though you probably have what we need to win this war. You would not believe the panic that is gripped the fleet Command at The Rock."

"What about the new fleet at the Rock Admiral. The new super Battleships?"

"They just tripled the temperature of the guns Captain without upgrading the tubes thinking all they had to do was carry extra tubes with a rapid change system. What do you think happens when they fired them?"

"They blow up the barrel tube on the second or third shot."

"Not that good Captain or they would be out setting up that trap you were talking about. At least the entry point is already reinforced with thousands of smart mine torpedoes just in case the Spider ships decide to venture into it again. Giving the squadron Commander plenty to play with witch is why I picked that entry point for them in the first place. But they still have 16 enemy ships running after them even after your fusion core trap took so many out with the 3 ships left from the first squadron hot on their heels. Very long odds. I am trying to get more mines and a few destroyer squadrons with your new torpedoes emplaced but I am not betting on them getting there in time."