Veil of Shadows (Book 2 of The Empire of Bones Saga) (15 page)

“Is something wrong?”

“I can’t say that I’m a big fan of going back over there.”

“Hopefully, we won’t need to go before the Pentagarans are ready to accompany us. Even if we do, fighting isn’t on our list of planned activities. The most I’d expect to happen now is for the computer to ask to send some probes a bit deeper into the Erorsi system for a more detailed scan.”

He decided to change the subject. “Lieutenant Reese tells me that you’ve taken some old Empire weapons back to your cabin.”

She stiffened. “We’re not going to fight about them, are we?”

He held up a conciliatory hand. “Allow me to take a moment to give you official permission to store them there and to carry them when we’re under combat conditions.”

Kelsey visibly relaxed. “Thank you. If we run into trouble, I want to help create a more positive outcome than last time. You should come down to the armory and pick up a pair for yourself. You won’t regret it.”

“I might just do that. I also hear you been working on armor. How’s that going?”

Kelsey smiled. “The damned thing is ridiculous. I’m already stronger than anyone has a right to be and it easily doubles that. I actually carried one of the weight machines across the gym. I know I’ll never use it, but it’s certainly reassuring to have it in the closet.”

He felt his eyes widen. “You actually have it in your closet?”

She laughed. “No, it’s down in the armory. I’m not paranoid enough to think that I need powered armor beside my nightstand.”

It took an hour for
Courageous’
probe to transition to the Pale Ones system, scan, and return.
Courageous
and her Pentagaran escorts had followed it toward the interdiction zone at a more sedate pace. There was still no enemy activity near the flip point and the probe they’d left on station was intact. He’d expected that since it was returning regularly to send them updates.

They sent over several more probes to scan deeper into the system. With the enhanced capabilities these probes commanded, they might as well get as good a picture as they could manage. It wasn’t as if the Pale Ones didn’t know they were there.

They only had to wait about an hour and a half to start getting decent information from the Erorsi system’s main world. One of the two shipyards was still constructing ships, but it seemed as though they’d abandoned the damaged one. Not only were there no ships present there, it was powered down.

Jared frowned. There didn’t seem to be any active ships around the planet. Surely, they hadn’t left it unguarded. Where were the remaining ships?

“Captain Mertz,”
Courageous
said. “This unit has located possible hostile units near Erorsi. There is a large object under propulsion. This unit believes there is a high probability that it is an asteroid on a collision course with the primary world in this system. This unit has witnessed similar events in the past.”

Jared looked at Kelsey. “If they’re going to conduct an orbital bombardment, that means there’s something down there that they don’t want us to have.”

“Do you think there are humans on that planet?” she asked. “Ones not converted to Pale Ones?”

His blood ran cold. “Probably. The descendants of the people they subjugated here. The AI needs a source of new recruits. My God, what if they’re going to exterminate all the slaves they have under their control?
Courageous
, can you determine how large the asteroid is?”

“Negative. This unit will need to redirect one of the probes to make that determination. However, this unit can gauge the remaining time before the object impacts Erorsi in just over twenty-five hours.”

Jared thought furiously. “Whether they’re destroying people or equipment, it might be in our best interest to see if we can stop them. Kelsey, I’m sorry, but it looks like I’m about to put you in danger.”

Jared turned to the front of the bridge. “Flip the ship into the Erorsi system. Zia, give Commodore Sanders a heads up. Pasco, flank speed to the asteroid. Everyone, keep an eye out for enemy ships. Our speed gives us an advantage in controlling an engagement. Let’s use it.”

Pasco gave the ship a thirty-second warning and flipped them into the Erorsi system. As soon as they’d recovered from the transition, Kelsey unstrapped herself and stood. “I’m getting my pistols.” She headed for the lift.

He eyed the tactical plot. “What’s our ETA?”

“A little short of three hours, Captain.”

The lift doors opened a few minutes later and Kelsey walked back on the bridge. She now had a gun belt around her waist with two large, unfamiliar weapons holstered on her hips. The one on her left hip was in a reverse holster with the butt pointing forward.

She gave him a look as she sat back down. “What?”

“It’s hard to wrap my head around you wearing a gun, much less two.”

“You’re lucky I’m not wearing my powered armor. I’d feel much safer inside it, but wearing it on the bridge seems like overkill.”

He leaned over and lowered his voice. “Have you seen the tactical situation through your implants?”

She nodded. “Yeah. Are we going to be able to stop that thing?”

“I don’t know. We just have to change its course enough to miss the planet. With the drives already installed, I’m hoping that will be possible. The tactical plot shows about a dozen ships guarding it, so we’re going to be in for a fight. Thankfully,
Courageous
is a much more capable vessel than
Athena
was. I think we can win that fight.”

“Even in her current condition?”

“I hope so. I’m thinking we don’t have a lot of choice.”

He turned to Zia and raised his voice. “We don’t know exactly where the remaining vessels have gone, so let’s not assume that they’ve left the system. I don’t want to be caught off guard thinking that every Pale Ones ship will come howling after us the moment they see us. We’re going to have to cross the asteroid belt, so keep your eye out for ambushers. They may not be capable of it, but I don’t want anyone jumping us like we did
Spear
in the war games before we left on this mission.”

“Aye, sir.”

It took them less than an hour to reach the asteroid belt. Jared kept the ship on high alert, ready to respond to any offensive moves.

Unlike the entertainment vids, a real asteroid belt had lots of space between the asteroids. And most of those hunks of rock were not very large, so hiding places were few and far between. That didn’t mean nonexistent, however.

Zia stiffened in her seat. “Enemy vessel detected! Multiple enemy vessels detected! They were hiding behind two large asteroids. We’ll be able to fire on the closest vessels in fifteen minutes. We don’t have time to retreat to the flip point. Passing scanner control to operations.”

Jared tapped his console and opened a channel to operations. “Charlie, what are we looking at?”

His executive officer’s face appeared on his console. “Three dozen vessels, Captain. Twelve will arrive in the first group and the remainder will come into range about five minutes later. The guard vessels from around the asteroid are also heading our way, but they’re an hour out. If we can take care of each wave quickly, we may be able to defeat each group separately.”

“Keep me informed of any changes in their status.” He looked at Zia. “What’s your assessment? Can we handle them?”

She nodded. “I believe so. I’m more worried about the second group. We’ll want to pick off as many of them as we can at long range. My people have seven of the twelve launchers online and sixty missiles refurbished.”

“This is your chance to show off, Lieutenant. Engage the first group as they come into range. Eliminate as many as possible and then overwhelm any stragglers. Be certain to destroy any of the vessels that use that stunning technology first. Tailor the electronic countermeasures as you see fit.”

“Aye, Captain.”

The Pale Ones vessels entered
Courageous
’ offensive envelope long before they got into range to fire missiles of their own. If they were using data from the fight with
Athena
, they were in for a rude awakening. The old Empire missiles had a considerable range advantage over the Pale Ones’ observed offensive capability.

“Opening fire,” Zia said. She touched her console and the tactical plot showed missiles streaming away from
Courageous
and toward the lurid red icons of the enemy. “Missile tube seven has misfired. We’re working to get it back online.” Zia fired a second wave of missiles just before the first set merged with the enemy. Unlike
Athena
,
this ship had missiles that could do more than attack. Some of them transmitted incredibly powerful bursts of energy that worked to blind the ships they were attacking with the plan of minimizing any defensive fire.

She could have saved the effort. None of the Pale Ones attempted to destroy the incoming missiles. The first wave wiped out five of the enemy. The remaining seven staggered into the debris cloud. Two more salvoes destroyed the remaining Pale Ones in the first group.

Time seemed to drag before the second group came into missile range. The next engagement mimicked the first one with the exception that some enemy vessels got through and launched missiles at
Courageous
.

Jared resisted the urge to order the ship to change course. It wouldn’t help them. It would only make him
feel
like he was doing something.

“Beam weapons online in defensive mode,” Zia said. Short, powerful beams of energy shot out to meet the incoming missiles, incinerating every one that they touched. They were much more effective than the railguns Fleet currently used, and they had a higher effective rate of fire.

But, they weren’t infinite. Several of the attacking missiles smashed into
Courageous’
screens and the overhead lights flickered slightly. “Screens down to eighty percent,” Zia said.

The enemy swirled around
Courageous
, firing into her screens at almost point blank range. The beam weapons reached out and incinerated them. In sixty seconds, they had destroyed the last of the second wave.

“Screens down to fifty percent. They should be back up to eighty percent by the time the stragglers arrive.”

With the ambushers dealt with, the last dozen ships were somewhat anticlimactic. They didn’t even try to flee. Zia destroyed them before they fired a shot. “Enemy vessels destroyed, Captain. We have seventeen missiles remaining.”

“Great work, everyone. Keep a good watch. They surprised us once. Let’s not give them another chance. Pasco, ETA to the asteroid?”

“We’ll be there in a little bit more than an hour, Captain.”

“Very good.”

He turned to Kelsey. “Well, that certainly went better than it would have if we’d still been in
Athena
. Hopefully that’s the worst of what we’ll encounter in this system.”

“I hope you’re right.” She didn’t seem confident that he was.

* * * * *

There were no more surprises on the way to the asteroid. The large piece of debris looked very much like most other asteroids Jared had ever seen, only bigger. The scanners pegged it at almost 10 kilometers in diameter.

It had massive, crude grav drives mounted in a large circle on its surface with a small facility built in their center. They detected no weapons systems, but that was never a certain thing.

Graves called him from operations. “Why build something on a throwaway asteroid? To control the drives? Why not plant some scanners on the front, plot a course, and send it on its way.”

Jared nodded. “That’s what I’d do, but we still don’t know what makes those things tick. Are they some kind of hive mind? Do they do things simply because someone programmed it into their heads? Or do they have some type of controller? A queen bee.”

“The question on my mind is, is it booby-trapped?”

“We’ll have to be careful. I don’t want to lose any people. We also need to take the drives intact or we won’t be able to change the course of this monster. Not in time. Courageous calculated that the impact would plunge Erorsi into deep winter for years. Perhaps decades. It would be short of an extinction-level event, but not by much.”

Jared opened a channel to engineering. “Baxter, we need you to form a team to go over to the asteroid and figure out how to change its course. We’ll be sending some marines and a navigator to help plot a better course for it. How long will it take you to get ready?”

The engineer grinned. “We’re suited up. Is the Princess ready?”

Jared frowned and glanced over at Kelsey. “No, why would she need to go?”

“I figure the chances are very high that this equipment requires an implant interface to control. It’s not as if the savages programmed the course in by hand. It’s very likely that we’re going to require her assistance.”

That wasn’t what he wanted to hear. “Go meet the marines at the pinnaces. I’ll get the last of this ironed out and let you know.”

After he closed the line, he turned his full attention to his sister. “You don’t have to go, but he might be right.”

She took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and let it out. “Of course he’s right. It was the only real way to interface with Twelve, and it’s going to be the method they use to control this, too. We should’ve realized that. I’ll go get ready.”

He watched her leave with more than a hint of trepidation. The very last thing he wanted do was put her back in danger. But if the Pale Ones thought something was worth destroying, he was certain that it was worth saving.

Chapter Sixteen

Kelsey sat next to Lieutenant Reese in the marine pinnace and tried not to hyperventilate. It’s going to be fine, she told herself. If there were any trouble, the marines would take care of it. Besides, shouldn’t she feel safer in this badass armor?

The answer turned out to be “not really.” The commando armor might protect her more effectively than the suits Reese and his men wore, but fear wasn’t exactly rational. She knew that she was well protected because they’d shot up a couple of these suits just to see how tough they were. Her heart still pounded in her chest and she was covered in sweat.