Federation Reborn 2: Pirate Rage (12 page)

Behind them the MITWs tumbled, then oriented themselves delicately with soft puffs of OMS. Inertia was bringing them to their target anyway, but their mother missile's suicidal charge would pave the way, buckling the shield in order to allow them batter it down and get through to the ship within.

The desperate
Nelson's
point defense lasers went into sweep mode, licking out to consume the MITWs but it was too late. The eighteen remaining drive cores went off with minor explosions of kinetic energy against the ship's shield. But the real punch came in a second later as the MITWs armed and went off. Eighteen of ten megaton warheads went off, hammering the ship's shields and stripping away the armor where the shields failed. The final failure of the grav nodes made them pop like a soap bubble in a tornado.

The MITWs that followed were designed to take on a larger craft; they were almost an afterthought. They consumed the destroyer in nuclear fire. Spreading gas was all that remained after a moment.

---<>))))

“Good bye, Fred. See you in hell shortly,” Captain Ryobi Kerinski said softly, looking at the hellfire as it dwindled behind his ship. For some reason the enemy wasn't targeting him with their missiles. Perhaps they had a glitch? If they could only be so lucky, he thought.

They weren't bothering with demanding his surrender either. Not that he would. But a delay to parlay might have worked in his favor; every moment he could buy his ship would mean they were working their way out of the enemy's engagement basket and kill zone. He was tempted to give it a try but shrugged the idea aside. He had no interest in being put through whatever interrogation they had in mind.

“Put
Chico
between us and the nearest fortress or platform.”

“Sir? Our orders are to protect her!” the XO stated.

The captain's eyes flared dangerously. “Hell with our orders! They won't fire into an unarmed ship. Sharky knows it, trust me.” He was referring to her skipper Sharky Fang, the dark skinned male with black eyes and a triangular shark's tooth he kept on a necklace around his neck. He'd been a good corvette skipper until he'd pissed the wrong person off in court and been dumped into the support fleet, durance vial and hell for many Horathian officers and enlisted. Those that were stuck there tended to sour of ever rejoining the “real” fleet, and not many ever got the chance. They were looked down on by the “real” warship officers. “Use her as cover and get us the hell out of here.”

“Sir, if we burn through our fuel, we'll be a dead stick,” the chief of the boat warned.

“One thing at a time,” the captain muttered, eyes searching back and forth for an escape but not finding any.

---<>))))

“Good firing, Guns,” the chief said as the CIC cheered.

“The other … quiet!” the commander barked, looking around the room. “You are professionals, act like it!” he roared. That silenced the group. “Tango 2 status?”

“Romeo and Alpha are firing, sir, from the updated profiles,” the again chastened ATO reported.

Romeo and Alpha, like many of the other platforms forming a spherical perimeter around the jump point were beam weapon platforms. Each of them had a ten-million-kilometer range on their sensors, but they could only fire on what they could see. They had to rely on additional sensor platforms as well as the fortresses or mother ships for guidance. Computer programs adjusted for the movements of the ship and then fired a fusillade of artillery fire to check to make sure they were on target.

Little more than two seconds later, the surviving
Nelson
saw the incoming fire and did it's best to evade. However, it was too late. Romeo and Alpha had it bracketed, and the sensor platforms near the
Nelson
uploaded fresh targeting data to them. The capital ship grade grasers could not be intercepted with counter missiles or PDLs. Before the
Nelson
could jig more than a kilometer off of its base course, the grasers found her and tore into her, ripping and gouging her shields, battering them down and then tearing into the hull. After the second fusillade, she was a slowly drifting wreck, a shell of her former self.

“Status on the freighter?”

“She's taken collateral damage from the missiles and debris, sir. She is adrift. She's pretty well shot to hell, sir,” the sensor officer reported, turning to look at the commander squarely.

“Thank you for that concise report,” the commander stated dryly. “Boat bay,” he keyed the link with his implants. “Launch alert fighters now, followed by a boarding party. Tell them to watch it though. That ship could be a ticking time bomb, what with the damage and hostile forces.”

“Aye, sir. We'll be careful.”

“Careful shmareful. I don't want to have to fill out any additional paperwork. This little wakeup call is going to take
weeks
to straighten out as it is! Besides, do you have any idea what those shuttles cost? They don't grow in trees you know!” the commander replied, voice slightly relieved and playful now that the worst was over.

He heard a snort from the chief then a soft chuckle of relief from the CIC crew. It was just the right sort of thing they needed to cap the engagement. “Get on it.”

“Aye aye, sir.”

“Well! That's a fun way to wake up in the morning. After action reports, people. Keep an eye out for any trailers. Also Comm, keep in constant contact with the boarding party. Feed them any details on the freighter you pick up as soon as you get it. Guns, I think you did a teeny tiny bit of overkill there, not that I'm complaining.”

“Yes, sir. But you can't argue with results. They are dead.”

“That they are. Now the question is, who were they, and what did they want?”

“I don't know. I do know that was one hell of a live-fire exercise. Sensors, anything on our visitors?”

“We're working on it, sir, going back over the sensor feeds now. We'll go through the Horathian war book as soon as we have the profiles built.”

“Understood. My money is on the pair of
Nelsons
that tangled with
Myoshi
a few months ago though,” the commander said with a slight grin at scoring something over his crew.

The sensor tech frowned thoughtfully then nodded once. “It could be them, sir,” he said slowly. “If it is, we're missing a freighter. I believe the last contact report had two large freighters, not the one, sir.” He frowned as he pulled up the contact report. “It … might fit, sir. One of the freighters was a
Caravan
class, the other an
Antares
like we see here.”

“That begs the question, where is the other ship?” the commander murmured as he watched the spread of four pinnaces move away from his fortress to the derelict ships. Fighters raced out ahead of them to secure the area. He was fairly certain they wouldn't find many, if any, survivors from the second
Nelson
. The
Antares
on the other hand was a different story. With a little luck, someone might have survived.

He turned to the chief. “Chief, have security prepped for possible incoming prisoners. Alert medical as well.”

The chief nodded. “Aye, sir.”

---<>))))

Corporal Mariko Yoshida looked on to her squad nervously, doing her best to hide the feeling. She wasn't certain if she was succeeding or not. It didn't seem to matter; most were eager at the crack at a real chance of combat.

She wasn't so certain it was wise. She rather liked the milk runs, the inspections of shipping that came through. This was a very risky job. But risk went with being a Marine. Besides, getting blooded looked great on her resume.

She was a chimera, what some fool in the past had dubbed a wolverine class. She had classic Japanese features, but behind them was something else. She sported a very effective healing ability, nearly four times human normal with a full regeneration factor. Her senses were enhanced even before she'd gotten her implants. She had a very powerful muscle system—one that was hyper efficient to go with her active metabolism.

Her bones had been very dense; her lymph nodes and marrow were filled with agents that filtered out or destroyed cancerous cells or other foreign bodies. It would also keep her looking young for a long time. That she could appreciate.

To top it all off, she had retractable claws in the top of each of her forearms. They came out at the base of her wrist and had some pretty good ligaments and structure; they could take a lot of abuse.

They also had to be constantly worn to keep them sharp and from growing too long. Anyone who joked about her doing her nails regretted it. Briefly.

In short she was someone's idea of a super soldier. She loved some of the abilities, but they came at great cost. For instance, she could hear a whisper anywhere, but that made her vulnerable to auditory damage if some idiot set off a flashbang. The same for light … the list went on and on. Her metabolism meant she had to eat a lot of calories and proteins to maintain her hyper efficient body. That sucked.

It was one reason why she'd opted to the marines. She had military training, years of it as a child before she'd left Konohagakure to seek her fortune among the stars. She was a shinobi, technically a missing nin, or ronin—not that anyone else knew that. She had enough grief from the intel spooks who kept interviewing her about why she wanted to join up now that they'd found out her home star system had fallen to the enemy. Her loyalty had been in doubt for a long time despite her passing every truth test they had thrown at her.

She shook her head. None of that mattered now.

“We're coming up on the wreck,” the chief of the boat stated.

“She's a colander. I don't see how anyone could have survived it,” the pilot said over the PA as the troops finished up their checklists. They left their visors up; everyone did. They hated being stuck with them down. Besides, they needed to conserve their air and power in case of need on the wreck.

“If they did they are in suits or survival bubbles. Mind the wreckage people, it's nasty. You can tear a suit quick,” the copilot Evers said over the PA.

“Deploying remotes now,” the pilot stated. Mariko closed her eyes to concentrate on her cerebral feed. The take was awesome but worrying. Bodies drifted out with the wreckage. “No sign of power or life signs,” the pilot stated.

“We should go to the other ship. Help out there.”

“We do our duty. Someone might be alive over there. Besides, we can secure her computers. There might be something on them we can use. Ah, the
Wizard of …
,” the pilot cut off. “The rest of the name is missing. I'll pass it on however.”

“The boat bay is nuts. We'll have to bring you in close to a lock, and then you'll have to walk over,” the copilot stated.

Mariko grunted. She hated space walks. It had been a while since she'd been on one. She didn't mind the dark; she did mind the risks involved. She also hated the lack of control. “Understood. Walker, rig a harpoon,” she ordered, turning and pointing a finger to the corporal near the lock. The corporal nodded and twisted. He and his buddy dug the harpoon out from behind a bag of tethers and cables. Luka worked on stringing the lines together while her partner unbagged the harpoon and got it ready.

“Remember, people, by the numbers. Don't shoot unless you have to. Ricochets can ruin your whole day. Mind the blow back as well,” Mariko said, falling into her training.

“Yeah, inertia is a bitch,” Luka muttered.

“I thought I was?” Mariko replied. That got a titter. “Enough,” she said coldly, looking around the compartment. “Focus on the mission, people. Mind the sharp corners. Watch for any sign of life. Motion is going to be everywhere. It's going to be a mess. Bump up your meds now to keep the gorge down. We need you to focus. You got that, Al?” She eyed the newest recruit. He nodded grimly.

“Close your visors and check. Pumping down now,” the chief stated. Mariko nodded and performed her buddy check. She exchanged a thumbs-up from Private Ziller and then watched the implant signatures of the rest of her squad. One by one they turned up green. Good.

“Right then. We go on three,” Mariko said, turning to the chief of the boat. The chief nodded and used his implants to key the ramp open. Walker didn't need her urging; he was already on one knee with the harpoon ready. He fired it into the hulk. It struck and locked onto a piece of the hull near an airlock with a dim light.

Luka, Walker, and the chief secured the other end of the harpoon line to the top of the boat and then drew it taut as Mariko clipped onto the line. “Remember, we don't have MMUs so don't get lost. Don't nick the line either. Walker, you get point next,” she said before he could argue.

She grasped the slider and kicked off slowly. Fear was there, but fear was the enemy. It let her know she was chancing the god of death, but she was a shinobi and a Marine. Such was her life. She wouldn't let her stop her, now or ever.

“Semper Fi!” she snarled, voice dropping low as she went out into the night.

---<>))))

Fleet Admiral and acting President of the Federation John Henry Irons read the initial hot contact report of the encounter at the B450a jump point and grunted. He immediately ordered a hot wash by a review board within twenty-four hours as well as a media release to curtail any panic, hysterics, or rumors. “This should set some people on their rears. And definitely get them to shut up about the orbital fortresses … at least for a couple of news cycles,” he growled.