Relentless (Fleet Ops Book 3), page 1
Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Reading Order
Free Books
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Reading Order
Relentless
By Scott Bartlett and Joshua James
Book 3 of Fleet Ops, a military science fiction series.
Relentless
© Scott Bartlett 2021
Cover art by Tom Edwards (tomedwardsdesign.com)
Typography by Steve Beaulieu (facebook.com/BeaulisticBookServices)
This novel is a work of fiction. All of the characters and events are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead or events is entirely coincidental.
Reading Order for Scott’s Books
At the time of writing, I have novels in 4 different universes, and a lot of readers have asked me for a chronological reading order.
I say: it’s about time. :)
This list is current as of March 29th, 2021.
The Ixan Universe
Ixan Prophecies Trilogy
Supercarrier - Ebook and Audio
Juggernaut - Ebook and Audio
Reckoning - Ebook and Audio
Mech Wars Quadrilogy
Powered - Ebook and Audio
Dynamo - Ebook and Audio
Meltdown - Ebook and Audio
Infliction - Ebook and Audio
Ixan Legacy Trilogy
Capital Starship - Ebook and Audio
Pride of the Fleet - Ebook and Audio
Dogs of War - Ebook and Audio
Fleet Ops Series
Trapped - Ebook and Audio
Counterstrike - Ebook and Audio
Spacers Universe
First Command - Ebook and Audio (Audio contains Books 1 & 2)
Free Space - Ebook
Wartorn Cluster - Ebook and Audio (Audio contains Books 3 & 4)
The Fall - Ebook
Empire Space - Ebook
Thatcher’s Gambit - Ebook
After the Galaxy Universe
The Unsung - Ebook and Audio
Unsung Armada - Ebook and Audio
The Crucible - Ebook and Audio
Mother Ship Universe
Mother Ship - Ebook and Audio
Want free books?
Scott is giving away a military space opera ebook, Captain and Command, for free, along with 1 other ebook in the same genre.
Tap here for your free books
Captain and Command is about Captain Vin Husher's fight to protect the galaxy's last hope.
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Chapter 1
Python Air Group
Expedition Group Nearspace
Fesky looked over the sleek lines of the Providence. It was a fine ship, perhaps one of the finest ships she’d ever flown from.
But it was no Relentless.
“Handing off on one,” said her wingmate, Deeder.
“Ready for hand-off,” Fesky replied.
The pair of them joined the rest of the patrol line as they streaked out into space to take over for the returning group that had been flying along the edges of the furthest scanner sweeps that the giant Providence could provide. The handoff mostly consisted of two squadrons saying hello as they passed. It was a staggered picket, one that Fesky had used countless times in the Milky Way to protect a battle group.
But this wasn’t the Milky Way, and the UHF expeditionary force was barely a battle group anymore.
Of the original carrier group, they’d lost three destroyers, two frigates and a cruiser, in addition to a half-dozen support ships—nearly two thousand souls in all. The loss of the Relentless was, of course, the hardest blow for Fesky and the rest of the destroyer’s air wing, many of which had survived the loss of their home ship.
But that still left the Providence, two destroyers, two cruisers, and a gaggle of frigates and support ships that needed protection.
“Handing off,” said Eightball. He led the inbound Gold team heading back to the Providence. “We’re bingo fuel and happy to hear some chatter. It’s quiet out there.”
“I’ll take some quiet right about now,” Deeder said.
“Look for interference as you get closer,” Fesky told Eightball.
“Copy that.”
The interference near the battle group was courtesy of the endless repairs going on. The group had dropped out of warp just six hours ago, and the repair teams had to deploy quickly and make repairs as efficiently as possible. That meant a crazy symphony of activity that got the ships back into flying shape as quickly as possible.
But the whole group had to be ready to warp out at a moment’s notice, which meant that repairs had to be delicately handled so that the ships weren’t completely down at any time. That limited what could be done. Almost every ship, if they were back home, would have gone into space dock for months of extensive work.
But instead, they were out here in the middle of nowhere, making repairs on the fly while they waited for—
“I thought they said it was quiet out here?” Deeder said. “I’m getting something on the far edge, near the deployed buoys. You see that?”
Fesky looked at her scope. She saw the contact Deeder was referring to. The scanners of the Providence were powerful, but the coverage had to end somewhere. At that point, a series of buoys had been deployed. While they were being set up, the fighter wings took turns running patrols out here, using their own shipboard sensor to extend coverage of space.
Now that the buoys were up, the patrols were free to push even farther out. Out where there shouldn’t be anything on their sensors.
“Could be them,” Fesky said.
“Can’t these bastards just give us a break for one damn day?” Pixie asked, her tone a mixture of exhaustion and defiance.
“Not now,” Messerly said. He was Pixie’s wingmate, and a Winger to boot. The clatter in his voice probably didn’t mean much to the rest of the human flight team, but Fesky registered the emotion in his tone. “Not now that they have us on the run.”
“They wish we were running,” Deeder put in. “We’ll kick their asses soon enough.”
“Like when? We’re weeks away from full repairs. It’s not like the Brood are scared of us.”
“For now, we buy time for repairs,” Fesky said, cutting off the chatter. “There will be time for—” Her beak snapped firmly shut. She was going to say more, but her computer had flashed a warning. Pattern detected.
The others’ computers told the same story. She heard a sigh over the coms, and was going to say something, when it dawned on her that it was her own sigh.
“That’s the Brood,” Fesky said. “Drop markers and break back for com contact.”
A dance that had played out several times over the past week now unfolded again. A pair of Pythons from the patrol stayed behind, watching and tagging the movements of the inbound Brood. The rest of the patrol headed back to a halfway point from the outer edge of the patrol, a position within the Providence scanner umbrella where they had good communications with the ship.
“Providence, bogeys inbound. Full launch requested.” Fesky didn’t have to wait long.
“Full air group is outbound,” replied Lieutenant McBane, the tactical officer aboard the Providence. “ETA to your location is three minutes for the leading edge. You are authorized to engage.”
“Understood,” Fesky said as she and the rest of the patrol spun around.
Now comes the fun part, Fesky thought. The patrol had one job, now: to hold off the Brood until the rest of the air group joined them. From there, the job was again one of stalling. The entire air group would give ground, slowing the Brood as much as they could. Meanwhile, the repair crews would be wrapping up as fast as they could and getting themselves stowed for wa
After that, the patrol would break off and run like mad for the waiting ships for another local warp to somewhere else in this hellish universe. Somewhere they could hide from the Brood and start repairs all over again. With interdimensional warp out of the question thanks to the Brood corruption of subspace, this was the best they could do.
“Here they come!” Deeder said. “Looks like five Stomachs, and they’re already unloading their little flying bastards.”
Scouting party, meet scouting party, Fesky thought as she sized up the enemy formation. As far as the Brood attack groups went, this one was small. Large enough to destroy the entire air wing in a face-to-face battle, of course, but small by the overwhelming standards of the Brood.
But there would be more soon.
“Weapons hot,” Fesky said, feeling the big railguns spinning up around her own Python fighter. They had a limited number of Sidewinders, but they were desperate not to use their dwindling supply of missiles if they could help it. Her scanner filled up with bogeys now. “Hit ‘em when you got ‘em.”
And just like that, space was full of Pseudopods. Fesky coolly fired on a trio of them that lined up perfectly in front of her fighter. The round punched through the first two, ripping the amoeba-like sacs wide open. The third behind it managed to maneuver away from the shot, but was still caught up in the blast of acid that exploded back from the first two. The acid wouldn’t hurt the Pseudopods, but it did create a temporary patch of obscured space, enough for Fesky to slip into and send another slug home. Her target deflated, and the Wayfarer inside burst apart.
But there was no time to celebrate.
“I’ve got three on me!” Deeder said.
“Come around,” Fesky shot back. She noted she’d picked up a tail of her own, but her wingmate was in more trouble at the moment.
A stream of acid tore through space, missing Fesky by less than she would have liked. She fired a snap shot and caught the Pseudopod, which had been engaged in a fight with another of the patrol, with just enough of a glancing blow to send it spinning.
She heard a scream, and saw that Messerly hadn’t been lucky enough to miss the dying Pseudopod’s acid stream. The acid ate through his Python’s outer shell with terrifying speed, decompressing the cockpit and dissolving through Messerly’s flight suit before he could do anything.
Fesky watched as Messerly’s helmet melted away, his feathers and beak exposed to space for just a moment before the acid splashed him, eating through his neck. Then his ship broke up, and Fesky was thankfully unable to see the rest.
“Fesky!” Deeder shouted just as Fesky lined up a clean shot. She fired twice and hit two of the pods on her wingmate’s tail. The third spun away to look for easier fights.
“Thanks,” Deeder said as new contacts burst to life on Fesky’s screen.
“Six more Stomachs,” she announced, managing to keep her voice level. At the same moment, she saw that most of her patrol was engaged now. They were already inside the first fallback point.
That was fast, she thought. Too fast.
“Providence, this is Fesky. We have eleven targets inbound, and we’ve crossed the first barrier. You have ten minutes.”
“Understood,” the Providence communications officer Ensign Zahid said, before she heard his voice squelch out and another voice replace it.
“Hold them off longer,” Admiral Iver said, his voice hard as flint. “That’s an order.”
Chapter 2
Combat Information Center
UHC Providence
“Husher, bring them around.”
Captain Daniels frowned. “Sir?”
“The Regent and the Bunker, Daniels,” Admiral Iver said. “Bring them around.”
“Uh, right,” he said. He glanced at tactical, where McBane looked back down at his console, but not before Daniels saw the look on his face. No, he wasn’t crazy. Iver had called him Husher. Again.
“Tactical, get our cruisers to form up and close on the right flank.”
“Yes, sir,” McBane said quickly, before relaying data through his console. “Anything else that—”
“Yes, get the information display out of the damn way,” Iver said irritably. “And get the tactical board up on primary. We need to be able to see where the hell these Brood are coming from.”
Daniels bit back the comment he wanted to make, which was that the admiral could have gotten that view from the extra console that Daniels had pointed out to him dozens of times. He also bit back the comment that he couldn’t possibly under any circumstances make, even though it was the one he most wanted to: Get out of the damn CIC and let me run my own ship.
Instead, Daniels reached down to his armrest and pulled up the side console, where he flipped the views that were on the screens ahead so that the tactical display was in the primary position. It was alight with green and red dots: ants showing all the ships, friend and foe, that the sensors had identified around the battle group represented in 3D.
Predictably, there were a lot of red dots.
“What the hell is Fesky doing?” Iver snapped. “That patrol team is giving space too quickly. At this rate, they’ll be on us before we can get the first of the repair ships stowed. Forget about the chance of actually winning this damn thing.”
Daniels didn’t care much for their chances of winning. He’d seen what had happened the last time they’d made a stand. In the end, if not for the help they’d gotten from their friends the Scions, they’d be dead. As it was, they’d been crushed and lost many good men and ships.
“We don’t need to be losing fighters, Admiral,” Daniels said.
“We don’t damn well need to lose ships, either,” Iver said. “Or is that not clear to you, Captain?”
“Quite, sir.”
Iver shook his head. “I need Husher here. He’s got the inside track on these damn things and his doppelgänger. He’d have some decent tactical advice for us.”
Daniels doubted the word “us” factored into anything at all. In fact, since they’d managed to rescue Husher at the Scions’ insistence, it was a point of concern among the senior staff that Iver had wanted Husher around for everything. He’d already called Daniels ‘Husher’ twice in the last five minutes alone.
“Medical isn’t going to clear Captain Husher for some time, if the reports are any indication,” Daniels said. “But in my opinion, Commander Fesky is executing a plan to spread out the fire among the Stomachs so that she’ll meet up with the rest of the air wing at the demarcation point of the sensor array.”
In fact, Daniels wasn’t entirely sure of that, and wouldn’t have said anything at all if he didn’t suddenly feel his own abilities questioned by Iver’s incessant need to bring up Husher in his CIC. It was bad enough that the admiral had taken it upon himself to walk all over Daniels inside his own ship’s CIC, but to also have himself questioned and play second fiddle to a captain that was in a coma in the medical bay was beyond what he could bear.
“If you’re right, Daniels,” Iver said, “then we have only a few minutes until—”
“Sir,” snapped Zahid. “We have a message from the Champion. The frigate’s got a problem with her warp engines. They didn’t come back online when the repair work was suddenly stopped. She’s having to respool.”
“Why were her engines cold?” Daniels said. “She was instructed to—”
Iver interrupted him. “How long?”
“Thirteen minutes.”
“Get on it.”
Daniels turned to the tactical screen just as Fesky’s voice came over the com, telling them what they could already see on the tactical screen. She was calling ten minutes.
Iver told her bluntly to hold on longer before cutting her off. He spun around to McBane at tactical. “Have the Strongbow and the Idaho come to the interior side. The destroyers are the first that should encounter these things. Then once we have a chance to engage, we’ll use them to shift the shape of the battle group so that we can buy some time for the Champion to spool up her engines.”
