Barbarians at the Gates

Chapter Fourteen

Jefferson System, 4092

Back at Luna Academy, each cadet had to go through a test that dated all the way back to the early days of human expansion into space. Indeed, its origins were somewhat mythological. The cadet was given command of a simulated starship—with the consoles manned, often, by a real starship crew—and ordered to complete a particular mission. What the cadet wasn’t told was that the simulation was rigged; no matter what the cadet did, the mission would lurch from disaster to disaster until the simulated starship was finally destroyed. Roman had, afterwards, asked the instructor why they were put through a test that had no victorious outcome. The instructor had replied that the test was intended to measure how they coped with stress, and how quickly they thought under combat conditions.

“Get me a full damage report,” he ordered, duly aware that he was barking orders to the chief engineer, a man with more years of service than Roman had been alive. The temptation to just give up was overwhelming, yet who else was there to take over? Everyone who outranked him was dead or missing, presumed dead. The poor bastards who’d been on the bridge when spears of antimatter fury had burned through the shields and hull would have been vaporized. “How many sensors do we have left?”

Enterprise was tumbling through space, but thankfully the gravity had remained operational, Even so, he could feel it in his inner ear, a sense that something wasn’t quite right. The carrier had not only been crippled, but punched out of formation and, without a clear idea of how badly damaged the ship actually was, he didn’t know if he dared power up the drives. The emergency systems had powered down the drives as soon as the ship had been hit and there was no way to know if they were still operational. The internal sensor network had been badly damaged and was barely functioning.

“The external sensor network is largely intact,” Sultana said. She sounded icily calm and in control, shaming him. RockRats were supposed to know, in their blood, how dangerous space could be and how only quick action—and no panic—could save lives. “We have incoming.”

Roman stared down at the tactical console. He should have taken the command chair in the center of the compartment, but there was no replacement for the tactical position, at least until they managed to find another lieutenant. Most of the tactical section would have been killed in the attack. There were enemy starships approaching Enterprise; four battlecruisers and a host of smaller craft. The sensors finally identified them as Marine Landing Craft. The rebels intended to board Enterprise!

Over my dead body, Roman thought coldly. He’d admired and respected the captain and the XO. It would have been a betrayal of their memory to tamely surrender the carrier to Admiral Justinian and the rebels. Besides, they were coming in fat and happy, believing that Enterprise was completely crippled. And that, part of his mind insisted, offered an opportunity to strike back.

The damage report started to scroll up in front of him as the internal datanet came back online. It wasn’t as bad as he had feared, even though it was still pretty bad. The main bridge and flag bridge—and surrounding compartments—were completely destroyed. The internal emergency system had sealed off the affected compartments before the atmosphere had been vented into space. One of the antimatter beams had gone through the port flight decks and effectively destroyed them, leaving the starfighter pilots stranded and unable to escape; another had destroyed one of the drive units. The remaining drive units—and shield generators—were intact, as were most of the weapons. Enterprise, given time, would be able to escape, yet it was doubtful that the rebels would give her time. It didn’t take years of experience to know that the damaged carrier was going to maneuver like a wallowing pig.

He ran through the vectors in his mind and smiled. Admiral Justinian hadn’t brought his superdreadnaughts close to Enterprise, either out of suspicion or because he wanted to point them at Admiral Drake instead. The battlecruisers would be in short range—almost point-black range—within minutes, but the Marine Landing Craft would dock with Enterprise before the battlecruisers were close enough to have no hope of evading his fire.

“Deploy the Marines,” he ordered. “Put them in position to repel boarders.”

He spared a single thought for Elf, and then turned back to his console. His plan was insane—he’d have been reprimanded sharply for proposing it at the Academy—but if the enemy just knew that Enterprise was crippled, they might not be too careful. On the other hand, if he opened fire too soon, the battlecruisers would stand off and pound Enterprise into a drifting hulk.

The enemy starfighters were engaging the remains of Enterprise’s CSP, clearing the fighter jocks away before the Marines moved in. Some of the pilots ignored the enemy fighters and targeted the Marine craft, thinning the force before they had a chance to dock with the Enterprise. Roman winced as he saw the starfighters wink out, one by one, knowing that each icon represented a living human being. How many of them had he known personally before the fleet had entered the Jefferson System?

Somehow, he pushed the thought aside. There would be time to mourn the dead later.

“Keep the active sensors offline,” he ordered as the enemy battlecruisers moved closer. A single active scan could tell him everything he wanted to know—at the cost of revealing Enterprise’s true condition. He had no doubts about how they would react if they realized the truth. “Track the battlecruisers with passive sensors only, but keep uploading the targeting data to the missile tubes.”

Enterprise’s designers had sought to create a starship that was a cross between a carrier and a dreadnaught. Roman had been told by Commander Duggan that, like other ships that attempted to combine two separate roles, Enterprise managed to be mistress of neither. She couldn’t stand up to a superdreadnaught—or even a battleship—nor could she launch and recover her fighters as rapidly as a fleet carrier.

On the other hand, at point blank range the battlecruisers wouldn’t know what was coming their way until it was far too late.

“The enemy Marines are moving in to dock now,” Sultana said dispassionately.

Roman turned to look at the internal display. The Marines—his Marines—had deployed themselves to repel boarders. The enemy was being predicable, heading for the holes they’d made in the hull. Roman wondered, suddenly, if Elf was thinking of him, perhaps cursing him for placing her in a death trap.

“Roman…ah, sir…” Sultana said.

“Spit it out,” Roman ordered sharply.

“Two minutes until the battlecruisers are within point-blank range,” Sultana said. “Can I suggest that we open fire on the remaining landing craft at the same time?”

“Make it so,” Roman said. The thought was a good one, even though the boarders might try to disable the ship’s weaponry as they advanced. “Prepare to fire.”

Where would they go, once they boarded the ship? Justinian must know they’d destroyed the bridge and the secondary facilities, so…engineering? They hadn’t landed anywhere near the engineering compartments, but perhaps they intended to secure the interior of the ship first. Boarding actions were rare, so Roman couldn’t be sure; as it was, he couldn’t recall a single example of a successful boarding action against a carrier or a superdreadnaught.

And this one’s not going to be the first…not if I can help it, he thought.

The enemy battlecruisers were much closer now, their targeting sensors sweeping Enterprise’s hull. Roman hoped that didn’t mean they had missiles ready to fire. A single antimatter warhead would vaporize the entire carrier. He braced himself as the final seconds ticked down, keying the tactical console and uploading precise firing instructions. All four battlecruisers had to be targeted and destroyed in the opening barrage.

“I have a message from the damage control parties in the starboard flight decks,” Sultana said. “They report that we can launch starfighters once they reroute power to the launch catapults. Many of the ready craft were destroyed when the ship was hit, but the remainder were held in their cradles and check out as being ready to fly.”

“Tell them to get ready to launch,” Roman ordered. He caught himself a moment later. “No, belay that; no power emissions until we open fire. We don’t want to scare them off.”

He looked back at the tactical console. The four enemy battlecruisers were just entering point-blank range. In terms of space travel, they were close enough to touch.

“Fire,” he ordered, keying the switch.

Enterprise shuddered as missiles spat from her tubes, already hitting terminal engagement speeds. The enemy battlecruisers were hit directly and three of them exploded as antimatter warheads knocked down their shields and hit their hulls. The fourth staggered out of position, only to die after Roman launched a second spread of missiles before the enemy ship could recover and start firing back.

“Get the drives and shields up,” he ordered. “Reroute power and launch fighters as soon as possible.”

It crossed his mind that he’d just killed—directly—thousands of people. A standard battlecruiser had a crew of two thousand. Assuming the battlecruisers had been fully-manned, he’d just killed eight thousand people—and however many Marines had still been in their landing craft when Enterprise’s point defense blew them out of space. RockRats knew death, understood it in all its forms, and yet…he swallowed hard, desperately trying not to be sick.

“The starfighters have been launched,” Sultana informed him. “The Marines are reporting that they’re holding, although the enemy are pressing them hard.”

Roman allowed himself a moment of cold amusement. The enemy Marines had just lost all hope of escape, or even of victory.

“Bring up the active sensors and launch drones,” he ordered. It dawned on him that he had forgotten something important. “Send a data package to Admiral Drake and update him on our situation. Inform him that we intend to rendezvous with his force as soon as possible.”

Enterprise quivered as her drive came back online. With one drive unit destroyed—and another suffering from a dangerous drive harmonic—there was no way that they would be able to maintain the carrier’s standard acceleration rate. They’d be easy meat for any enemy superdreadnaught that happened to get into missile range, yet at least they would be moving and heading towards help.

At least he hoped so, as the time delay hadn’t allowed them to see what had happened to Admiral Drake—for all Roman knew, Admiral Drake might have been cut off from them, or destroyed. Seventy superdreadnaughts and over a hundred smaller craft wouldn’t go easily, yet Admiral Justinian might have the firepower to destroy them. Roman might only have postponed the inevitable.

He scowled as the active sensors started to fill up the holographic tank. There were hundreds of enemy starships out there, including swarms of starfighters that appeared to be attacking another enemy force. It took the computers several minutes to isolate the friendly craft from the enemy ships, but it didn’t look good. Admiral Drake’s ships were under heavy attack. Roman tried to think of something they could do to help, but there was nothing. They could barely help themselves.

The sensor board pinged, altering the display. One of the enemy fleets was a decoy, composed of nothing more than decoy drones. Roman tapped a command into the console, ordering the data forwarded to Admiral Drake, even as he ordered Enterprise to alter course. The fake enemy fleet couldn’t stop them from breaking through and escaping into interstellar space…

“Orders from the flag,” Sultana said. “We are to shift course as directed and prepare to link up with the remainder of the fleet.”

Roman grinned when he saw the projected course. It was the course he’d already ordered.

“Inform the admiral that we may require help evicting our unwelcome guests,” he said. The enemy Marines were still clinging on, refusing to surrender or to be wiped out. “And perhaps some additional damage control teams.”

Even with the improvised StarCom network, Admiral Justinian hadn’t the time to respond to the sudden change in his fortunes. Enterprise had somehow escaped capture—he had no illusions about how long his remaining Marines could hold out—and was heading towards one of his decoy fleets. The carrier’s sensor drones had to have penetrated the ECM, an annoying development considering he’d hoped that Admiral Drake would not be able to isolate the real formations from the decoys; worse, it had allowed Admiral Drake to alter course and avoid interception by two of his forces, either one of which would have been sufficient to destroy the damned Senatorial lackeys once and for all.

“Redeploy Beta Force and Gamma Force,” he ordered, wishing he had more troops available to deploy. But Delta Force was guarding the Asimov Point and couldn’t be moved, unless he wanted to cope with the enemy fleet suddenly reversing course to dive for the Asimov Point and escape. And Alpha Force was too far out of position to intervene. “They must move to intercept the enemy fleet before it crosses the mass limit and escapes.”

Once the computer projected the various fleet courses in front of him, he scowled. Apart from the starfighters and gunboats, there was no hope of a short-range missile duel, unless Drake’s fleet could somehow be convinced to reduce speed. Of course, it was possible that Drake’s lackeys would slow their speed long enough to escort their damaged ships out of the system, but he knew of Drake. The man was no fool, even though he was on the side of the Grand Senate, and would have to know better than that. Losing his entire force would be disastrous.

“And bring up the modified carriers,” he added. “I want constant starfighter attacks, wearing down their defenses before Beta Force is within range to finish the job.”

“Aye, sir,” Caitlin said.

Justinian adjusted the display until he was looking at an overall vision of the Jefferson System. The enemy fleet was heading away from the Asimov Points, which meant they must intend to cross the mass limit and escape in stardrive. It wasn’t a bad plan, but it had a big downside: they’d be exposed to missile fire for hours before they could escape. His ships could reload at will, while the enemy’s supply train was—quite literally—six hundred light years away. They wouldn’t be able to resupply until they escaped.

He allowed himself a smile. The battle hadn’t gone entirely according to plan, but then—what battle ever went exactly as planned? At least the Senate’s lackeys were on the run. All his forces had to do was keep piling on the pressure. Even if a handful of Drake’s ships escaped, the so-called Retribution Force would be broken and disorganized.

Once they were, he would be able to capitalize on his victory and claim the throne that was his by right. After all, his backers had promised him their full support.

Marius skimmed through the report from Enterprise with a growing sense of disbelief. The carrier had been crippled by precision strikes—using a new weapon that needed to be identified and countered—and her captain had been killed, along with the admiral. A mere lieutenant had taken command, a very junior officer who was nineteenth in the chain of command. How badly had the ship been hit?

On the other hand, the young officer, Roman Garibaldi, had been lucky—and luck was a quality that Marius had learned to value. And besides, it wasn’t as if he had time to appoint a new commander for the Enterprise and ship him over to the carrier.

And young Garibaldi might just have saved the entire fleet. By identifying one of the decoy fleets, he’d allowed Marius to alter course ahead of time, saving him from having to engage one of the enemy formations at close range while others came up behind his ships. Whatever else happened, Marius silently vowed, Garibaldi would receive the Navy Star—perhaps even the Federation Star—for his heroism. Under the circumstances, even the Senate couldn’t disagree.

He turned back to study the display as the next wave of enemy starfighters screamed towards his ships. Enterprise would be a very welcome flight deck for his starfighters, whatever the inherent limitations of their design, as most of his carriers had been picked off or damaged by Justinian’s forces. They weren’t the only ones. Two superdreadnaughts had been destroyed, and several more were badly damaged. The Zhan was on the verge of falling out of formation and being destroyed by the enemy. And yet, he might just get the entire fleet out of the trap…

“Admiral, Bogey One and Bogey Two are altering course—ah, have altered course,” the sensor officer reported. “They’re moving to intercept us.”

Marius swallowed a curse as the display updated. There could no longer be any doubt—somehow, Admiral Justinian was transmitting orders at FTL speeds. How, Marius had no idea. Perhaps he’d simply pulled every StarCom he could find into the system and used them to coordinate his fleets.

Marius sucked in a breath. Three converging lines met on the display, just beyond the mass limit. He saw no way of avoiding a long-range missile duel, at the very least, not with Justinian’s starfighters snapping at their heels. He briefly considered turning and trying to tackle Bogey Four head-on, but Bogey Four had enough firepower to devastate his force if his maneuver didn’t work. So the only way out was through.

He silently cursed Parkinson under his breath as he considered the situation. His tired crews were about to run another gauntlet.

“Launch another set of sensor drones,” he ordered grimly. “And then arm half our fighters for antishipping strikes. Perhaps we can pay the bastards back in their own coin.”