My Life: An Ex-Quarterback's Adventures in the Galactic Empire (23 page)

The manager sent a pilot over to maneuver the Flower into one of their docks. This wasn’t an insult to our helm, he was quick to say. He was just unwilling to take any chances that an errant ship might damage their facility. Once the Flower was docked, Aalori swarmed through her, pulling up the decks and tearing apart the control panels and the engines, not to mention off-loading our cargo. It took almost twenty days of around-the-clock work to complete the job. During that time it was almost impossible to move around the ship. Much of the deck had been opened. Wherever there was an Aalori working, there were two or three machines working with him. Since the crew weren’t interested in liberty on the station, this created a problem. We finally struck a deal with the station to give us an otherwise empty area for the duration. There was no extra charge. The Aalori were just as uncomfortable having to work around us and were happy to have us elsewhere.

Kaaran was still a long, long way from Yttengary. Too far to make it in a single transit. The likelihood of there being a wormhole between two points, n parsecs apart, is roughly inversely proportional to n
³
. This means that any lengthy interstellar trip has to be broken into a number of shorter hops. Reaching Kaaran would require a minimum of five transits. Nevertheless, I’d said that I would deliver Jaenna to her home, so that was the destination we set when the rejuvenated Flower cut loose from Yttengary station.

The only concrete part of my plan, at that time, was to bring Jaenna home. Beyond accomplishing that, my mental images blurred. I would, naturally, try to extract some type of reward from her family. Jaenna had told me enough for me to realize that the lavish reward I had held out to the crew was purest fiction, but I hoped that Tyaromon would make a token payment to let me save face. After that, I was even less certain about what to do. Part of me wanted to take the Flower back to Earth (assuming I could find it) and have Ruoni set me down there. I would gladly leave the ship to Ruoni. I had seen the great galactic civilization and was not impressed. On the other hand, there wasn’t much reason for me to return to Earth. What was waiting for me? Scandal and bankruptcy, not the most attractive combination. Out in the empire, I had a ship and crew of my own, if I wanted them.

It was a difficult choice, and events conspired to prevent me from ever making it. At the end of our third transit, we reached the gray zone where Inner Empire fades into Outer. I have no idea what system it was, nor does it matter. We had just popped out of the wormhole when Cardoni’s board lit up.

“I have a contact, Captain Danny.” He rattled off the bearing and distance.

“Identity?” I asked.

My question was barely out of my mouth when Cardoni answered it with, “Fleet IFF.”

The Fleet! I had heard about the Fleet, the real Fleet, not the kvenningari units, ever since I had joined Carvalho but had never seen a member or a ship anywhere in my travels. To have it appear on the screens like that was to have the mythic bogeyman jump out of the clothes closet. I remembered that the Fleet didn’t care for freebooters.

“I wonder what he’ll make of us.” I spoke to the room in general, not really expecting an answer. Ruoni gave me one anyway.

“We made enough alterations at Yttengary that our signature will not look like a merchanter on his screens,” he said. “I think he will take us for a freebooter, Danny.”

“Lovely. Cardoni, what does he have?”

“Looks like a cruiser, Captain Danny,” he replied after a few minutes with his instruments. “He’s behaving oddly, though, as though the ship is running heavily on automatics.”

I was as curious to know why it was odd as I was to know the reason for it. Blahar at Navigation supplied the answer before I could ask.

“Personnel problems most likely,” he said. “The Fleet’s always understrength and it can only have gotten worse recently. That would be the only acceptable reason not to have decentralized control anywhere outside of friendly orbit.” Blahar had been born and raised on a planet in the gray zone and considered himself a native of the Inner Empire and an expert on the Fleet and Imperial politics. This time, I thought, he was probably right.

“Understrength or not, he is turning on us,” Cardoni announced.

“Damn!” A cruiser was a hefty battlewagon. Even Carvalho’s Flying Whore didn’t measure up to that kind of ship. “Andrave, see if we can talk to him. Blahar, find me the nearest wormhole. I don’t care where to, just away from here.”

It took Andrave only a short while to run through the standard communication channels. The Imperial wasn’t interested in talking. With the course he was taking, that could only mean bad news. By the time Andrave was finished telling me that, Blahar was ready with his report. The screen showed a three-dimensional display of local space with the positions of the ships and three red ovals to mark the locations of the wormholes. Since wormholes are not necessarily bidirectional, the one we had just exited didn’t show.

“Those are the only ones we have at least a seventy percent chance of reaching before we’re overhauled. In no case can we begin transit before the Imperial is able to engage. And here,” he pointed out, “are the calculated odds of our being able to transit without his being able to follow.” Those numbers were very depressing. None was greater than fifteen percent. “This assumes, of course,” Blahar resumed, “that no significant damage results from the engagement.”

Ah, yes. Believe that one and I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. “Take the highest transit probability and feed the course to Helm,” I ordered. “Maximum acceleration.”

Max acceleration or not, the screen still showed bad news. The Flower just didn’t have the legs to run away from a ship like that cruiser. The distance between us narrowed.

“We are in range of the Imperial,” Cardoni reported. Almost immediately, Ruoni reported our shields up and weapon systems ready. Andrave’s ship-in-action alarm hooted over the intercom. The wormhole we had chosen was still a long way away.

“Command, I have a signal from the Imperial,” Andrave said. “It’s a flat demand to surrender and be boarded.”

Somehow, that didn’t seem like a good idea, not as long as we had any chance to run. “Ignore it,” I ordered.

The Imperial wasted no time after the transmission. Lights flared and flickered across the screen as the cruiser’s beams hit our shields. At that long range, nothing got past the shields. Ruoni sat, glued to his board, as he allocated the beamers at our small weapons to the fight against incoming solid shot. Firefly flickers in space told of their success.

“Enemy missiles loose!” Cardoni shouted. The screen showed two dots that separated from the cruiser and charged at us at huge velocities.

An entirely separate war was waged between the missiles and the Flower. Instruments on their missiles sought out the Flower to give their computers a target to home in on. The Flower tried to defeat this by jamming the missile sensors and projecting false ship positions. More instruments on the missiles worked to sort through the fakery and find the real target. Meanwhile, the same battle was fought in reverse as the Flower worked to find the missiles and anticipate their course. This multilayered electronic war took place at the speed of light and totally independent of any personnel on either ship. The only evidence that that was happening at all was the occasional flickering of the dots representing the missiles when the computer became confused about their true location. Rapidly, the missiles closed in, dodging now and again when a beam touched their shields.

Then, first one dot, then the other, flashed red. The computer had developed a firing solution with a finite probability of a kill. When that happened, the crewman at the defense board tracking the missiles had a split second to decide whether to accept the solution and fire the counter-missiles, or wait for a better one.

The deck rattled as a rack of counter-missiles shot off. Having fired its load, the rack retracted to be outfitted with more missiles, in the event that we survived and needed them. On the screen, a crazy game of tag in three dimensions developed as our missiles chased their missiles which chased the Flower. Suddenly, the screen was lit by two tremendous flashes.

“Both incoming missiles intercepted,” Ruoni said.

I wanted to jump up and down and shout for joy at the news. That, however, would have been uncaptainly. In any case, my exultation was short-lived. We might have handled the Imperial’s first two missiles, but he had continued to close in on us. His beams and shot began to score. Overloads at the shield led to burn-throughs into the ship. Damage control reports began to fill the intercom. Then, as the lessened distance reduced the available reaction time, the shot started to come through and batter the ship’s armor. One shot sailed through without being hit by any of the defense beams and smacked into the stern. The whole ship bounced on that one.

“Command, this is Engineering. Power output is down ten percent. Auxiliary Reactor Room Three is breached and we have casualties.”

That news sparked a comment from Blahar.

“Command, with the power degradation I show only a twenty percent probability of making transit and no probability of the Imperial being unable to follow.”

Damn and double damn! “Continue the same heading, Helm. Continue to evade as necessary. Navigation, keep recomputing as we go.”

It wasn’t very inspirational, but what else was I going to do? The only hope I saw was that the Imperial might make a mistake in his approach during the battle and open up an escape hatch. Our chances, however, continued to shrink as more hits rocked the Flower.

“We are not going to escape, Command.”

The unexpected, flat declaration from behind me made me turn with a start. Jaenna was standing there. I didn’t remember her coming onto the bridge, but I was pretty preoccupied.

“Are you suggesting that we surrender?”

“No!” she said vehemently. “The empire would treat us all as freebooters. No parole, just execution.” There was uniform agreement around the bridge.

In a way, I was glad to see that she included herself in the “us.” I had been thinking that surrender might at least save Jaenna. I couldn’t divine, however, what her alternative might be.

“Let me take the Strike Force in,” she offered. “The Fleet is poorly prepared for that kind of fighting. And he must be very short of personnel to run on automatics in a fight. We can take him.”

I hesitated. She wanted to take a hastily trained force, most of whom had only the skirmish on Gar for experience, in three souped-up landing boats—against a Fleet cruiser.

“There are no better choices, Command.” The Battle Language sounded incongruous coming from her, but she used it as though born to it. After she finished, the ship shook to another hit.

The bridge crew was watching me. I had no choice. I turned to the main screen and managed to eke out, “Do it.” The damned Imperial convention forbade me to use her name and I could not call her the impersonal Strike Force Command. I also did not want her to see my face as I said it. By the time I turned around again, she was gone.

“Strike Force to the attack boats,” Andrave announced over the speakers.

And almost as an echo, “Strike Force ready for launch.”

“Launch Strike Force.”

The boats cut away with a jolt. The screen showed their twisting progress as they headed for the cruiser. Probably, the Imperial commander didn’t realize, at first, what Jaenna was doing. He was between us and the star system, so he most likely assumed that some of our crew were trying to escape the battle. Thinking that, he ignored the boats and continued to pummel the Flower. The intercom carried a continuous litany of Damage Control reports, worsening with time. The air on the bridge became stuffy as the circulating system was knocked out. Then, the fire at the Flower slackened as the target of the boats’ twisting course became, unmistakably, the Imperial cruiser. The screen showed the space around the boats alive with defensive fire. I was on the edge of my chair as they bored in. Halfway there. Then, two-thirds. Then, a fireball lit the screen, briefly.

“Attack Boat Two has been hit,” Cardoni said. He made no comment about survivors, nor was it necessary to do so.

What boat had Jaenna taken? There was no way to ask, not in the middle of a fight. I watched the remaining two dots continue dancing with death and realized how slim their chances were.

“Command.” It was Blahar, cutting into my thoughts. “The way the cruiser is reacting to the boats gives us a forty-eight percent probability of making transit at the wormhole, even with our engine damage.”

I thought about it. I thought about leaving Jaenna and her force behind to cover our escape. That was what Blahar’s probability really meant. I didn’t have to think very long.

“Helm, bring this ship to an attack position.”

“Aye, Command.” From his tone, it was a popular order.

The screen showed the cruiser, now off our bow, Flower’s beams splashing off its shield in useless pyrotechnics. We were firing solid shot too, but none of it seemed to have an effect. I wish I could have said the same for the incoming fire from the cruiser, which was slowly tearing us apart. Most of our support services were out. Only half of our main beams still fired and one of the railguns was wrecked. The single positive note was that the Imperial appeared to have decided that he could finish us without wasting any more missiles. We were drawing fire from the boats, though. Just maybe, I thought, we could do an even better job of that.

“Fire Control, are all six missiles we bought operational?”

“Yes, Command. No critical damage to the missiles or launchers.”

“Good. Fire all of them.”

“All of them?”

“You bet.”

Economy with missiles was drilled into every officer. They were too expensive to throw around carelessly. Unless you believed that the defense was completely overmatched, as the Imperial must have when the fight started, you worked to degrade the opposing defenses to increase the odds of slipping one through. The cruiser was presenting no such opportunity. I was ready to gamble, however. With six missiles out, we might be lucky. If one of them slipped through and blew the cruiser, it would save both the Flower and the Strike Force. If not, well, they might further distract the cruiser’s defenses from the attack boats. If the boats didn’t make it, we would be unlikely to have any use for a second volley.