Under Siege, page 29
It turned out that the other ship did both of those things. It opened fire on Decadent Arrow with its antiproton beam, blowing the ship apart, but it didn’t really seem to care about killing the pinnace because moments later, Amanda saw its fusion drives come online. It was only a brief glimpse because something smashed into the pinnace hard enough to send it tumbling, but she knew that meant the other ship was leaving them to die at the hands of the Novarites.
“We’ve got a problem,” Strange said in a tight voice. “The pinnace’s drives aren’t responding. We’re dead in space.”
Of course they were.
She knew Lisa’s ship was around here somewhere, but she hadn’t been willing to count on it being their savior. Now, it didn’t seem like she had much of a choice. Either the hacker would come looking for them, or they would die.
She kept that firmly in mind as she tried to keep the pain at bay. It just kept getting stronger, and eventually, she had to call for help. Strange made it back to her even though the pinnace was spinning madly and strapped into the seat next to her.
“You’re bleeding badly, and I need to do something about that,” she said.
Amanda was all for that, but her brain was getting fuzzy, and she recognized that she was probably about to lose consciousness. She only hoped that she’d wake up when this was all over. Right now, her fate was in Strange’s hands.
And with that, she passed out.
32
Lisa watched the ambush in horror. The sight of humans turning on humans like that sickened her, but there was nothing she could do to stop it. Her ship was trailing behind the rest, and even if she’d been inclined to use what weapons she had, she wasn’t within range to do so.
Worse, there were far too many kingdom warships for her to be able to act. No. She needed to focus on accomplishing what she could for Amanda. If her friend was even still alive.
The majority of the kingdom warships had moved out immediately after decimating their brethren, leaving wrecks and debris floating in their wake. One warship hung close, but she couldn’t tell what it was doing. Her view of it had been somewhat obscured by the battle—if battle was even the right word—and its actions didn’t make a lot of sense to her.
She opened a comm channel to David. “I lost track of which ship Amanda was aboard in the chaos. Is it still in one piece?”
“Let me roll back the sensor readings,” David said, his voice tight. “I knew they could be treacherous, but I never expected anything like this. It’s monstrous.”
“Patrick was right,” she said in a low voice. “He warned us these were the kind of people they were, and I didn’t believe him, not down deep. Now I know better. If they’ve killed Amanda, I’m going to make them burn.”
“Okay, I’ve got it. It’s in bad shape, but it’s not completely obliterated. In fact, it’s not far away from that warship that’s hanging back. Maybe they’re sending someone to rescue Field Marshal Strange.”
“You think she agreed to have her ship shot out from under her?” Lisa asked, trying to keep her incredulity out of her voice.
“No, but that doesn’t mean they wouldn’t want a hostage when they go home. We don’t understand exactly what their game is yet, and until we do, there has to be a reason why they’re focused on that ship. It’s probably a good thing they are because that means Amanda has a chance of being alive. If we wait for them to go away, we might be able to get to her.”
“I can just kill them.”
“Take a step back. If you launch antimatter missiles at that warship, you’ll probably kill it, but you’ll let every other ship know we’re here. Worse, the Novarites will know something is going on, and they might look more closely than they otherwise would. The only chance we have to save Amanda is to pick her up without being noticed before the Novarites arrive. How far off are they?”
She checked her console. “If they don’t bother slowing down, they’ll cross this area in roughly twenty-five minutes. If they intend to board any of these wrecks, they’ll have to shed some speed, and it might be as much as an hour.”
“They won’t slow down. They have no reason to. They’ll probably blast anything that looks like it might still be in one piece as they come screaming past, but their focus has to be on the remaining kingdom warships. We already know how their military works, and even though half of their number are headed back to Vesuvius, we’ve stirred up a hornet’s nest, and they’ll sting everything they can.”
She thought about that and found herself nodding even though no one could see her. That pretty much matched up with what she’d learned about the Novarites over the time they’d been fighting them. They didn’t take prisoners, so why would they slow down? That meant they had an extremely tight timeline to work with.
It took them five minutes to finish closing the distance between Field Marshal Strange’s ship, and the warship still hadn’t moved. What were they doing? There was no sign of any small craft between the two ships, and they had to get going if they intended to get away from the Novarites. As the old saying went, the tide waited on no one.
“I’ve got a small craft coming out of the damaged vessel,” David said. “Do you see it? Is it Amanda?”
Lisa checked her screen and spotted the small craft. “Negative. It’s of kingdom manufacture. Probably whoever they sent is getting ready to head back home.”
As much as she wanted to light them up, she wouldn’t. Once they were gone, she’d head over to that wreck and find Amanda. They didn’t have to get away cleanly. So long as she could get her friend in hand, they could just float there in space and be undetected. That gave her less than twenty minutes to make the magic happen.
She hoped it was enough.
Then the small craft did this weird maneuver where it spun itself like it was rolling and then ducked behind the wreck right before the warship fired its antiproton beam weapon into the damaged vessel. The ship blew apart in a spray of debris.
Before she could react, the warship engaged its fusion drives and leaped away at high speed. The fact that it had fired on that ship and hadn’t picked up the small craft meant that whoever was aboard it wasn’t their friend, and that gave her hope. Maybe Amanda was on it. Right now, that was really the only chance she had of rescuing her friend because the ship was no longer habitable. Anyone that had been aboard it was certainly now dead.
“Did you see where that small craft went?” she asked. “I lost it in the debris. I think it’s probably got Amanda on board.”
“Don’t let wishful thinking put you in a corner,” David warned. “It’s possible that other crew members from that ship took it over. I want her to be on that pinnace, but we can’t count on it. Understand?”
“Oh, I understand, but I’m not going to let that stop me from hoping. I need an intercept course.”
Even as she was talking, she was using the passive sensors, trying to locate the pinnace among the wreckage and having no luck. Gritting her teeth, she engaged her active sensors at low power. There!
“I’ve got them,” she said. “They’re tumbling loose and don’t look like they have power. I’m bringing the ship as close as I can, but I’m not sure I’ll be able to match course with something tumbling like that.”
“Get as close as you can and see if you can reach them over the radio,” he suggested. “I’m sending the professor up to help run the ship while you see about getting them aboard. Speaking of that, how can you manage that?”
“Let’s cross that bridge when we get there.”
She maneuvered close to the tumbling pinnace and examined it visually. Something had smashed into the rear half and crushed it. Probably a piece of the ship that had been shot with the antiproton beam. Frankly, it didn’t look like it could hold pressure, so everyone aboard might be dead.
If she had to board it in her suit, she would, but she’d give the easier path a chance first. She activated a short-range radio and signaled on all frequencies. “Amanda, this is Lisa. Can you hear me? Respond on low power if you can.”
There wasn’t any immediate response, but she did pick up just a hint of a signal and focused the power in her receiver on that. She boosted it as much as possible, though that would make what she got sounded really bad.
“Repeat what you just said,” she said on that frequency. “This is Lisa.”
“This is Field Marshal Strange,” someone said. The voice was so distorted that she could barely make out the words, much less tell if it was the kingdom commander. “Who is this? The computer expert? How could you possibly be here?”
“Is Amanda with you, Field Marshal?”
“Yes. She’s injured and has passed out, but she’s alive.”
“Good! The Novarites are about fifteen minutes away now, and I need you to get out of the small craft. I can’t pick you up until you do. Hurry.”
“I hope you can get us aboard because we don’t have any way of maneuvering ourselves once we leave this pinnace. Still, I suppose it beats being killed. We’re coming out.”
The professor came into the control room right as Lisa stood. “They’re going to be coming out of the pinnace shortly. I don’t know which direction they will go or at what speed they’ll be flung off, but I need you to maneuver the ship to get them onto our hull. Be gentle because Amanda is hurt.”
Lisa left him to maneuver the ship and raced to the aft airlock. She’d trained on using the suit and had done so several times, but this was the first real emergency, and she was in a hurry. She forced herself to slow down and put it on methodically. This wasn’t the time to make a mistake.
It felt like she was taking forever, but she knew it was only a few minutes before she was inside the suit and had its life-support system running. “Bridge, can you hear me?”
“Loud and clear,” the professor said. “Two people came out of the pinnace, and I’ve matched course and speed with them. I’m edging over slowly, but I don’t want to put them on our hull until you are there to catch them. The Novarites are getting close, so allow me to urge you to move quickly.”
“I’m going as fast as I can. Exiting the ship now.”
She cycled the airlock and let herself out onto the ship’s hull. There were rails she could use to clip tethers to so she wouldn’t come off, and she took the time to clip onto one before heading on top of the ship. “I’m on the upper hull, so if you can bring them to me, that would be helpful.”
“Maneuvering now. They should be coming over the horizon momentarily. Guide me in and make sure I’m not going too fast.”
As promised, two figures seemed to float up over the side of the ship and hang above her. One of them was obviously Amanda based on the uniform, so the other would be Field Marshal Strange. Amanda was limp in Strange’s grasp, and neither of them were in vacuum suits. All they had on were full face masks that must be providing oxygen. How long had they been in the vacuum with that? That couldn’t be safe.
She braced herself with her magnetic boots locked on the hull and slowly guided the professor in edging them closer. The end result was the two people above her head sinking down to her level until she could grab Amanda’s greatcoat. That brought both of them down within reach. Now that she was closer, she could see that it was indeed Field Marshal Strange behind the other mask.
It was difficult, but she started pulling herself back to the airlock while Strange held her with one hand and gripped Amanda with the other. Once they reached the airlock, she gestured for Strange to go first. It would be best to get her inside before she managed to somehow come loose from the ship. Strange released her grip on Amanda, and Lisa pushed her into the airlock.
“Field Marshal Strange is in the airlock,” Lisa said over the radio. “Have David meet her there.”
“He’s already waiting,” the professor responded. “How is Amanda?”
Lisa took a moment to look at her friend’s bloody shoulder. She couldn’t see much of anything, but if it was something keeping her unconscious, then it was serious.
“She took a hit to the left shoulder, and it looks bad. Thankfully, her face mask looks like it’s tight, and she’s still breathing. We need to get her inside and let David get to work.”
The airlock opened, and Lisa pushed Amanda inside and cycled it. The wait while it cycled seemed interminable, but it couldn’t have been more than a minute. As soon as the outer airlock door opened again, she disconnected her tether and climbed inside. As it was pressurizing, she wound the tether up and put it away so that it would be there when she needed it next time.
“We’re all aboard, so get us away from the wreck,” she said over the radio. “I don’t think the Novarites will see us, but I don’t want to be anywhere near those antiproton beams when they sweep through here.”
“Understood. I’ve already been moving us away, and they’re still about ten minutes out. I think we’ll be all right.”
The inner hatch opened, and she stepped into her ship, cracking her helmet open and tucking it under her arm. Amanda lay on the deck with her emergency oxygen mask tossed carelessly to the side. David and Strange were hovering over her, and they’d already gotten Amanda’s greatcoat off. David was using a knife to cut the uniform tunic to get better access to the wound. It looked ugly.
“Let’s pick her up and get her to my bed,” she ordered as she set her helmet on Amanda’s stomach. “David, there’s a medical bag in my quarters, so you can keep working on her while I figure out what we do next.”
“Understood,” he said, closing his knife up and putting it back in his pocket. “Everybody get a good grip. We don’t want to drop her.”
The three of them picked Amanda up and staggered down the corridor to Lisa’s quarters. When they were inside, they quickly got her on the bed, and Lisa pointed at where the medical bag was before gesturing for Strange to follow her.
Strange had lost her emergency oxygen mask somewhere. It must’ve been under Amanda’s abandoned greatcoat. The other woman looked pointedly at the ship around them. “How did you get so close to us without us knowing you were there?”
“That’s one of those secrets we were keeping, but it looks like it’s been revealed,” Lisa said as she gestured toward the bridge. “If you’ll follow me, we need to get in motion. What the hell happened?”
“We were betrayed,” Strange said grimly. “Duke Ahren’s people tried to assassinate me, and then they attacked our ships. Vice Admiral Harris saved my life several times over.”
“Why would they do that? What would they have to gain?”
“There is enmity between Duke Ahren and Duke Jost. It has to have been related to that. Technically, I don’t work for either of them. I’m sworn to the king, so by attacking me, they’ve committed treason. They couldn’t afford to even chance that I survived. My suspicion is that they intend to go home and claim that I bumbled my way into some kind of ambush and lost half the fleet. I doubt very seriously that Duke Jost or the king would truly believe that, but without evidence to the contrary, there is plausible deniability.”
Lisa made it to the bridge and set her helmet next to the command seat before sitting. She quickly looked over the console and saw that the professor had moved them a good distance away from where the wreckage of the kingdom ships tumbled through space. The Novarite ships were almost on top of them, and it was difficult to tell, even at this range, whether any of them had spotted her ship.
“I’ve seen a bridge like this before, and that makes my questions for you even more pointed,” Strange said as she stood there with her hands on her hips. “This is one of the king’s spy vessels. You said you’d found a wreck, but that wasn’t precisely the truth, was it?”
“No,” Lisa admitted. “The truth is a lot more complex than that. One point to clear up, though. This is not one of your spy ships. It’s a newly constructed vessel built using a derivative of the plans for one. There are some things that are the same, but other modifications were made for me.”
“I’m not personally familiar with the interior of any of these vessels, so I have no way of judging whether that’s true or not,” Strange said. “You’ve already lied to me once, so why wouldn’t you do so again?”
“Oh, I will surely lie to you again at some point. That’s kind of the nature of the game. I am an expert at computer hacking, and I have a very deep knowledge of Novarite and kingdom systems, but my primary job is for Confederation Intelligence these days. You see, I’m a spy, and this is my ship. Her name is Specter.”
“And I’m Professor Alan Prescott,” the professor said with a slight bow. “We never had the opportunity to meet, but I’ve heard a great deal about you, Field Marshal. Perhaps we could adjourn to the galley and have some coffee while Lisa does what she needs to do.”
The field marshal looked at Lisa and smiled a little. “This conversation isn’t done, Miss Gane, but I’m willing to let you do what you need to do right now. Again, I’m grateful that you were here to save our lives, but I will get answers to all my questions.”
Lisa gave her a bright smile. “You’ll have to get used to disappointment because while we might answer some of your questions, we won’t be answering them all. I’ll let you know once we’re in the clear and when I’ve made a decision about what we’re doing next.”
As soon as the two of them had left, Lisa locked the hatch to the bridge. She didn’t think Strange would attempt to knock out the professor and come back to take control of the ship, but she wasn’t going to take chances. There were only three of them aboard to watch her, and David was busy with Amanda while she flew the ship. It was far better to be safe than sorry.
With that accomplished, she watched the Novarites as they overran the area around where her ship was and used their weapons to vaporize the larger pieces of wreckage as they passed. Within seconds, they were gone, still pursuing the kingdom warships, and there was nothing left behind but the dead and Specter.
Now she needed to make a decision about what happened next. The smart thing to do would be to head in a completely safe direction and wait until she could rendezvous with Hunter.
