Battleship Destroyer (74 page)

Jack chuckled at that
one as the cart trundled along. Pop and Jack had spent hours arguing the reason why fiction righters had thought man could not go faster than light long ago (but worm holes and hyper drives were just fine). When Scientist on old Earth before man made it to the stars insisted that light was the absolute speed barrier when it was so obvious to everyone now, that Gravity was the speed barrier. Looking at Einstein’s Calculations Jack could not understand how anyone could make the error Einstein had made even if it was only a couple of calculation decimal points. Especially since the results did not quite match so many real world observed facts. They were usually off by several percentage points and required what engineers back then called fudge factors. Ridiculous when a simple calculation change accepting Gravity as the max speed got rid of the need for all the fudging crap. Pop argued the mistake was natural for the time but when observed facts that questioned the dogma became obvious, they should have not turned Einstein into a God and science into a religion. Pop warned Jack to keep a careful eye out for people that do the same in the modern universe. The concrete rule that nothing could pass the speed of light almost cost man the stars as well as extinction.

The carts practically flew
through the ship and around airless sections, through passageways with damaged equipment and bulkhead air patches. Finely they raced into the hulks own vault still in perfect condition.  The Captain turned to Jack. "If there was any other way to reliably destroy this hulk beyond the enemy’s ability to reconstruct an engine I would use it but nothing beats a multimillion degree, mile wide fireball."

What had Jack surprised the most was during their trip
through the hulk and the passageways that were dark holes only lit by dim scattered emergency lamps; he could see far into the ship. See the few remaining power lines, see the heat and radiation from the many crewmen still being rescued around the ship as well as the crew that was being evacuated through the half dozen locks attached between the Parsley and the hulk. Jack caught a glimpse of another ship docking onto the other side of the hulk. Each time they went from a dark passageway back to the lights, Jack found himself being able to see a little longer before being washed out by the glare around him. With the vault section being lit by only half the normal lights and with the ones that were working trying to fail flickering off and back on, Jack found himself paying more attention to the rescue efforts and the condition of the ship around him than on what the Captain was saying.

Finally
with the bomb safely in the vault, the armored hatch started to close and stopped as the power went out to the hatch. The Techs started cranking the emergency manual power supply. Working up a sweat as they took short turns trying to keep the pace up. The huge hatch slowly started to close an inch at a time. Looking around Jack shrugged and stepped over to take his turn.

"No Mr. Turner. You are an officer. Senior at that. If you want to help? Use your head an
d go get warm bodies to help them."

Jack frowned as he looked around then smiled. Stepping
around the feverously cranking crewman and over to the back of the base attachment point of the thick arm he pulled off a cover and pushed a button hidden in the recesses of the machine. The arm sprang back to life closing the heavy hatch in only a few seconds.

With the questioning
look from the Captain, Jack continued to smile. "You said to use my head so I did sir. Looked like a power surge blew a week breaker stopping the energy path. Hard to miss once I looked for it instead of panicking."

As the hatch locked closed the Captain turned to the cart train driver. "Take us to this hulk
's one remaining boat in B lock." Then to the comm on her wrist. "To all personnel, this hulk is set to self-destruct in 6 hours. I want everyone off in 3 and at least a hundred miles away. Out." As the cart train made its way through the ship using the unused elevator shafts lined with weak grav coils and missing their elevator cars as a highway the Captain sighed. "Now all we have to do is decide if we need to move the other ship alongside this one or try to save it. I hate to have to lose another ship but it can't out run that damn enemy fleet on one engine unless it can leave now and it does not look like that is very likely right now."

They entered the lock and ran up the shuttle boat's stern ramp. The shortened cargo space in the back told Jack that it was an Admiral's barge with not only the accommodations and extra comm and sensor equipment but had the tanks and the range of a small ship.

"Mr. Turner, you are piloting. You still have 15 minutes to get me to the Red Pepper. I don't want to be late so get your butt up to the boat's bridge and get us out of here. You have my permission to blow the lock hatch to save the five minutes it takes to evacuate the air since we are scuttling the ship.  I am going to be in Flag Comm. Call me when we are docked."

Ten minutes later
Jack dimmed the Bridge lights as they pulled up to the wounded ship. Docking control was on the line with several shuttles ahead of them giving Jack a few minutes. Carefully looking it over, he could not see that much damage even inside the ship. That is if you ignored the bow's command and control section and a couple holes half way through the top cargo holds. Or were they mass tanks? It really did not matter to him. He still could not believe how many hits it had taken from the side, blowing tunnels clear through the ship. He was shocked to see hot spots scattered all across the upper section with several rescue parties making their way through the mess and then noticed a lot of movement in the ship's bow torpedo room. "Good, survivors. Looks like about a hundred in all I think. It is going to take a while to get them out." He turned his gaze toward the stern and the engines.

Then the Ensign spoke up
, making Jack jump. He had lost track of her outside the bridge. "Jack. It looks like they tried to turn around just before they were hit, making them the biggest looking target out there to the enemy. Probably why the enemy targeted them instead of the ships facing them so all six guns could fire.  Looks like only half the ship's guns fired which makes sense if it was broadside to the enemy."

"Are you seeing what I am seeing Ensign?"

"Yes Jack. I see crewmen still alive scattered all over the bow section."

"
Oh yes. I saw that. No, what I am talking about is the stern. I see little damage and then that is from the enemy ships smaller guns as close as we are to them. Without all that much damage."

"Ok. That does not make sense. The Commander
had said the engines where to badly damaged to repair. Speaking of the enemy ships. This Red Pepper is getting damn close to them. Whoever turned the ship, turned it in the wrong direction and changed the course from passing, to heading toward the enemy ships instead of away from them. I know astronavigation in weightless space orbiting around large mass bodies, especially a cloud is hard but that is a stupid mistake by someone that must have thought that turning away from the enemy meant getting away from them but instead wound up headed for the enemy as their orbit changed." She turned to look at Jack. "I don't think the ship was being piloted by the bridge crew Jack."

Jack
finally got clearance and the Admirals Barge nudged into the ships open port side boat bay as a gig slid out the hatch on the other side of the ship ahead of them. Jack could not believe what he saw. The bay was packed with lifeboats parked wherever they happened to land. A gig was sitting next to the half circle core hull protruding out the side at the center of the bay with battle suited marines pushing lifeboats off to one side trying to make room to unload equipment and cargo containers from the gig (boat). With no place to set the Admirals barge down between the scattered lifeboats. Jack hit the comm, punching up the marines. "Damn it. Don't just push the damn lifeboats around. Throw the Damn pieces of junk off the ship and clear the bay and be quick about it. We need room to get more gigs in here. NOW." Jack knew of at least 5 other gigs waiting to get in the bay he had pushed ahead of.

Jack hovered as the half dozen squads
of marines in the bay ran as only Battlemech suited marines could, to the large 20 by 40 foot hatches and started pushing the lifeboats out the hatches starting with the boats closest to the outer hull after doing a quick check to make sure each was empty. The marines able to slide each boat out the hatches into weightless space and around onto the hull up away from the hatch and clip a short safety line to hold it from drifting off. It did not take long for the 60 marines passing boats from deep inside the bay to the outer hatches and outside the hull too waiting marines to clear enough room for Jack to finally drop down next to the shuttle still unloading cargo containers from its stern ramp at mid bay. Another gig was already entering the bay.

"Why are they unloading weapons containers?"
The Ensign asked. "This is a rescue mission not an assault."

Jack g
lanced down as they passed over the containers and smiled. "Marines never go anyplace without their weapons. They never know for sure where they are going next or when, so leaving them behind anywhere is a big no. Especially during wartime. You never know when the enemy is going to strike. Don't worry they also brought plenty of rescue equipment after all that is one of their primary jobs you know." The Battlemech suited marines main job was tearing up ships to get at the enemy so that made them damn good at digging out trapped crewmen from battle damaged ships where ships crewmen dare not venture. Each squad was equipped with experts in extraction, demolition, emergency repairs, construction, cutting and a Medic making them perfect for the job. Each ship had at least one squad with the battleships usually having several. With some 15 ships sending their squads to help, Jack knew the priority was clearing the bay so they could get there. With a good hundred trapped in the bow, they were all going to be needed.

Jack
finally got the Barge down on the deck and hit the Comm. "Captain we are docked and...”

"Yes
, I can see Mr. Turner. Good, rite, even if you are a few minutes late. Meet me at the airlock hatch."

Looking around the boat bay
through the Barges side airlock ports he started noticing old garbage scattered over the compartment bay along with rust patches on the bulkheads and overhead from paint that was exposed to vacuum too soon after application and then subject to long periods of moisture. "Damn, I thought this was a new ship?"

"Yes, it is only 6 months old Jack."
The Captain came into the lock with her helmet already on but the face shield up. "Though it is from a Dwarf that kept it manned with a skeleton crew. So it should be well maintained." They closed their helmets as the inner hatch closed and blew the locks air as the outer hatch opened not taking time to pump the air out.

As the
boat’s ramp hit the deck, the Commander they had seen earlier stepped up onto it. "Admiral Halsey I am Commander Buttoner, we are ready to evacuate the ship. The crews are getting the last of the trapped men from the bow out now."

The lock
's lights flickered and went out, replaced by the dim emergency lights in the distant corners and above the hatches and the marine's lights scattered around the lock still pushing the lifeboats out the hatches. Jack could suddenly see the entire ship including the finer details of the engines and the engineering spaces only a few decks away.

The Admiral stepped off
the ramp and headed for the bay's airlock hatch into the ship.

"See the damn ship is falling apart Admiral. We don't have much time."
The Commander ran after the Captain.

The Captain
shook her head. “What is wrong with your engines? Did they take direct hits? I don't see that much damage on this end of the ship."

"Yes they got hit Admiral. Can we leave now?" The
Commander tried to block the Admiral/Captain from entering the lock but Jack pushed past him followed by the Ensign.

"Ah Commander. Where were you when the ship got hit?" Jack asked as something suddenly downed on him. The Commander was in too much of a hurry to leave.

"Me Lieutenant? None of your business shit head. Now let's get out of here."

The Admiral/Captain
kept walking, looking at Jack as he asked the question and then her eyes narrowed at the Commanders answer. "Well it is my business Commander. Where were you?"

"I was trying to save the ship when we got hit and then with half of my engineering crew on those stupid boats making a suicide run against my orders and then
more being killed in the attack I don't have the personnel to fix them if I could. Now let's go!"

"You were on the emergency bridge Commander." Jack said disgustedly.

"Yes, so what Lieutenant. That was my duty station with half the senior officers on those stupid boats. It was not my fault the Captain was pointing the ship directly at those monsters. I tried to save the ship."

"
You didn't even try to repair the engines did you Commander?" The Captain said as the large cargo lock half full of marines and equipment containers waited for the lock to pressurize.

Jack stoo
d at the lock's control screen tapping icons as a torrent of air rushed into the lock blowing lose papers and debris around, across and through the marines and cargo containers. The light turned green with a large "O" telling everyone even in the heat of battle when colors are hard to see that the hatch was safe to open. Opening his helmet with most of the rest Jack heard the hatch motors start straining but the hatch remained closed. Jack hit the hatch’s controls stopping the motors and then tapped the air control and the hiss of air blowing into the lock could be heard as men started closing up their helmets or simply swallowing to equalize the pressure building up on their ear drums.