Resilience (Warner's World Book 6) (22 page)

2
^nd
Lt Johnny Warento, the BS officer, was staring past Hec at Meg. He was stunned and speechless. 2
^nd
Lt Lulu Kamara the CI officer was struggling to hold it together. Her left hand was shaking. She forced it to the surface of her workstation in an attempt to still it, but still it shook.

It was 2
^nd
Lt Shivani Usman, the OPS officer who spoke first. “Are we going to make it?” She looked like she was ready to bolt for the escape pods.

The sirens were blaring while the pilot wrestled to regain control using the thrusters. Hec was desperately trying to flick through each of the damage control reports, but it was made all the more difficult by his harness. His heart was racing and he found it hard to breathe. He knew this was fear. He forced himself to focus. He glanced next to him and saw Meg recovering from the shock of the impact. He glanced back to his terminal and saw red everywhere. “We’re not going to make it” he said to Meg.

“We are going to make it” said a determined Meg.

Hec grabbed her arm and said again “No we’re not.”

Meg was struggling to come to terms with it. Her lower lip quivered and she seemed frozen.

“Abandon ship” hailed Hec.

“I’m in charge” she finally bellowed.

“There won’t be much to be in charge of” said Hec as he undid his harness. He pointed to the damage diagram. The rear half of the ship was all red on the display.

“Oh fuck!” raged Meg. She hit the self-destruct control and then her harness release control.

The close in pulse cannon and beam weapons were still firing on auto as the command staff ran down to the escape pods on A deck. Hec and Meg were the last to launch in their pod.

Meg was gritting her teeth as the pod blasted out. ‘Fuck it’ she thought. Her mind was not filled with fear about being targeted by the enemy or of not getting far enough away before the Raptor blew up. No she was thinking of how bad this would look on her record.

Hec was accessing the terminal in front of them ascertaining how many of the 50 pods on board the ship had launched. He counted 32. “Shit” he said as he realised that meant 36 of his crew were dead or were about to die.

“What?” she barked at him. Hec just pointed to the number on the screen. She glanced quickly at it and then as quickly turned her gaze away.

She felt Hec’s hand gently touch her forearm but she brushed it away. She would not look at him. She couldn’t. She hated failure. She had rarely tasted it. But this tasted the worse by a long way.

‘What did I see in you?’ Hec asked himself. This experience, and her reaction to it, stripped away the last piece of his delusion. He felt a little shudder go up his spine and into his shoulder, followed by a little shake of his head. He put that down to his body getting rid of the detritus.

‘Right’ he said to himself ‘where are we headed?’

With renewed determination not to be distracted by the person next to him he worked the controls on the terminal. They were headed for the planet’s surface. He looked at the coordinates and then queried to find Neeblo. It was the only place he knew, other than Lewista and Mintoslum, and he did not want to end up close to either of those. The AI accepted the course change and Hec settled back for the ride in.

He saw the Raptor’s icon disappear from his screen and Hec Shoebridge thanked his lucky stars he was still alive. Even if she wasn’t interested, he resolved he would do his best to find everyone from the crew once they were on the ground. ‘Someone’s got to show some leadership here.’

Chapter 16. Neeblo 1346, 21 September

“We’ve lost one” called out Selinta. She wasn’t sure which of the three frigates because they still had not exchanged ship signatures.

All eyes including Dave’s were focused on the holo. ‘Let it not be the Phantom’ prayed Dave. No sooner than he had thought it he reproached himself for it. He knew as the commander he should be impartial. But it was hard to be when his future sister in law was involved.

“They’ve warped away” added Selinta. “Looks like they’ve destroyed a frigate and three transports”.

Dave shook his head. ‘It wasn’t worth it’ he said to himself. He instinctively brought his left hand to his face and squeezed his chin. Then he became aware of the gesture and pulled his hand away. ‘Get a grip Dave’ he said to himself.

Felis and his staff were now into the next phase of the battle as the enemy force began engaging Group Bala. Dave though was focussing on the icon for the Resolute. The Tenacity’s icon was ghosted but in formation with the Resolute. Dave knew the Resolute would cloak any minute now. He checked their projected course and saw that they were climbing away again. He deduced that the shuttles and droid pods had already been released over the south pole and were now racing towards Mintoslum.

Chase remained quiet in his observer chair along with Julian and Jeb. He wasn’t used to this passive role. There was something about it that numbed his senses and his emotions. He too prayed that it wasn’t the Phantom. He liked Aubrey a lot. They had gone through a lot together. As far as he was concerned she was family. He felt a knot in his stomach tighten just as it had happened when he witnessed Kat when her fighter was hit.

‘It doesn’t mean anything’ he said to himself in a stern manner. He looked forward and could see the side of Dave’s face. In that moment he knew they both shared the same thought.

In that moment Dave turned around toward Chase. It caught Chase a little by surprise like Dave could read his mind. In a way they were all tuned into each other. Dave had a grim expression. Chase could see Julian nodding to Dave. Jeb looked equally grim faced. Then Dave beckoned Chase to come over to him.

When Chase came up and bent down next to Dave, Dave said in a quiet voice “I need to get to Mintoslum. I want you to stay here and act as liaison to Admiral Draag on operational matters.”

“Can’t Commodore Pious do that? I should be with you” said Chase.

Dave was struck by how emphatic Chase had been with his last sentence. He took that as a sign and changed his mind. “All right then, scrounge us up some transport.”

Chase gave a pleased look. “On it.”

At that moment Dave’s communicator beeped to advise him of a new incoming message. It was from Ivan just before the Resolute cloaked.

“It was the Raptor” said Dave trying to sound impartial but the relaxation of his face muscled betrayed his feelings. Chase put his hand on Dave’s shoulder and nodded. His face seemed to relax too. Both men gave a weak smile of recognition.

Jeb came over and asked “what’s up?”

Dave saw Felis cut him a glance, obviously annoyed at the distraction. Dave, with his arms out wide, turned the two subordinates and they walked back to the edge of the room where they could talk without disturbing the ops staff.

“It was the Raptor” said Dave to Jeb. “We’re going to Mintoslum.”

“Shouldn’t we try and get back to our ships?” asked Jeb.

“No. This battle will be won and lost on the ground at Mintoslum. Fate’s been kind to us in that regard.”

“Well forgive me Sir, but I don’t see it that way” said Jeb a little frustrated.

Dave acknowledged him with a nod. “I know you want to be with your ship but our prime objective must be to deny that facility to the enemy.”

Chase was shaking his head at Jeb and Jeb took the hint by nodding his acquiescence to Dave.

“Commodore Warner” called out Felis. Dave turned and saw Felis beckoning for him to come back. When Dave did he could see on the holo that Group Bala had warped away. He could also see a group of enemy fighters that had raced ahead after the returning Resistance fighters. “Can you commit your fighters to …” but then Felis saw the Lightnings emerge from the Resolute and Tenacity and fire a full payload of their missiles at the enemy fighters. They in turn fired their own in defence and some more at the Lightnings who were already returning to ship.

“Did you mean that?” asked Dave.

“Yes very good.”

“I think I should go to Mintoslum and command my ground troops” said Dave.

“Wait” said Felis, his attention being drawn to the enemy force now heading closer to the planet. The icons for the Resolute and Tenacity had changed to indicate they were now cloaked, and this was their last known location. The enemy was changing formation, pushing out his lights to act as long range pickets in a hope to catch out the stealth ships.

“It’s not a bad tactic” admitted Felis to Dave. Dave nodded.

“Yeah it raises the risk threshold for a close in beam attack” said Dave.

“So what will Commander Kiralenko do then? I would like for them to wait until the enemy launch their transports into the final assault run and then make a missile attack. I can support that with the use of my remaining ground based missiles.”

Dave nodded and quickly sent Ivan a message to that effect. Felis left him to it but once he was finished Felis said “I really need you or one of your staff here to coordinate these arrangements.”

“Commodore Pious could do that.”

Felis leaned in close and whispered “He is a political officer, no?”

“What about Captain Wilson then?”

Felis nodded. “You will need transport…anything else?”

Dave patted his pistol holster and said “Something with a bit more punch than this.”

Felis summoned over one of his staff while keeping an eye on the enemy icons on the holo as they got closer and closer to the planet. He said a few words to the staff officer and then cut Dave a glance and said “He will see to your needs. Good luck.”

As Dave rose to follow the staff officer, Selinta called out “Enemy fighters launching….shuttles launching.” This grabbed Felis’ attention. He looked to Kraag, his expression asking a question that Kraag instinctively knew. Kraag checked his terminal and shook his head. Their fighters were only just landing. They would be too late to stop these.

Dave got up and told Jeb that he would be staying here and directed Chase to go with the staff officer. When he turned back to the holo he could see the Resolute and Tenacity icons were active again, two streams of missiles emanating from them and heading towards the enemy shuttles. The lightnings had also launched and fired against the enemy escorting fighters. In response the enemy caps and fighters had all launched more missiles, their tracks would cross in the next couple of minutes. Dave saw his caps turning and heading away. His fighters were in a beeline to marry up with them. He knew they would be too fast and too far to be hit. He was glad of that. But he wasn’t glad that the enemy missiles outnumbered theirs two to one. There would be few hits on the enemy shuttles but the enemy was burning through his missile stocks.

“You had better go” said Felis “Those shuttles will be entering the atmosphere in 12 minutes and on the deck in 22.”

Five minutes later Dave finally managed to get the borrowed backpack to fit after expanding its straps to their maximum length. It was now loaded with spare energy packs for the borrowed Rogan pulse rifle, two rogan grenades, an odd shaped container supposedly filled with water and a pack of hard rations, none of which he could discern.

Chase being a bit smaller had no problems with the backpack and was waiting for him by the door. Their hopper pilot was outside waiting for them. “We need to go” called out Chase, conscious of the time it would take them to get there and the fact that the enemy fighters were closing fast.

Dave picked up the pulse rifle and jogged to the door that Chase had just gone through. The hopper was on the far side of a clearing about 100m away. The pilot had already started the engines and was waving for them to hurry. Chase was already a good twenty metres ahead.

Dave envied Chase’s youth. It was at that moment with his focus distracted that the top of his boot rammed into the antenna stay. The antenna was a temporary thing, pegged into the ground and held upright by virtue of several wired stays each 2mm in diameter. The wire went through a hole in the peg, twisted back and wrapped around itself, and then held tense by a small metal device.

Normally the wire would have been cut off after the metal retaining device but either due to haste or slackness one had not been cut off. The taught metal wire protruded like a rod at about 20 degrees to the ground and this was what pierced Dave’s boot and penetrated a good 5mm into the top of his foot.

The immediate pain was intense and Dave instinctively withdrew his foot causing him to loose balance and he crashed to the ground with a shriek of pain. Chase turned in response to see Dave clutching at his foot. He ran back to him. “Are you all right?”

Dave was shaking his head, his teeth gritting hard to control the pain. But he couldn’t hold it and let out a very loud “Fuck!” followed by a “Help me up.”

Chase did so and Dave hobbled for a few paces before testing his foot. It supported his weight but hurt like hell.

“We should get someone to look at it” said Chase.

“Yes, when we get there” spat out Dave.

“Are you sure?”

“Come on.”

With Chase’s help Dave hobbled to the hopper and climbed in. He could see some blood oozing out of the neat hole where the wire had pierced the gutter of his boot. It was running down the laces. He thought of pulling off the boot there and then but opted not to for fear he may not be able to get the boot back on.

The pilot took off as soon as the door was shut and quickly accelerated. It stayed low skimming across the rooftops and then the open terrain barely 20m above the ground. At nearly 500kph the terrain disappeared under the front window at a dizzying rate.

But Dave had another cause for feeling dizzy. The throbbing sensation was getting worse and he cursed not having any pain killers with him. “How long?” he asked the pilot.

“Nine” answered the pilot briefly without taking his focus off his flying.

“We’re not going to make it” said Dave. The pilot ignored him.

Chase leant forward to be closer to the pilot who was seated in front of them. “Will we get there before the enemy?” he asked.