The Otherworld Rebellion (War of Alien Aggression #9) Page 23

  Ram said, "It's time to call the Legion's Master Sergeants and individual captains to the briefing. I'd like to use one of the Doxy's holds."

  Foet swallowed. "What do you need all that space for? It's just Devlin's Privateers and the Shediri captains, isn't it?"

  "I want all of them at the briefing, every last one."

  Foet ran a gloved hand over his face. "You're talking about over a hundred longboats docking in the middle of all the loading and unloading of parts and the repairs on the decks. Respectfully, Mr. Devlin, it'll slow my crews down and piss them off how we went and made their jobs harder."

  "Then tell our captains aboard the surrounding ships to open the hatches and swim to the Doxy," Ram said. "They're all close. We'll begin their briefing in 60 minutes."

  27

  ICV Sajjada, 50-meter junk

  3 million Ks out from Otherworld

  Bix's gloved hand came to his neck and tried to scratch the itching through his exosuit. There was still atmo in the junk's cockpit and no sign of the Xihute yet, so he popped the latches at his collar ring and lifted his helmet off his head so he could get at the jagged scar across his throat. The Shediri had given him that scar as a boy. Emmy said it itched when danger was close. He said it itched all the time.

  "Now, I'm getting nervous," Emmy said once she saw. She double-checked the passive LiDAR array's sync with the stealth systems.

  Bix's voice came out rough as a grinding wheel. "We don't need to recalibrate that thing to the energy shunts, do we?" He looked out through the dust and frost on the diamond-pane canopy. The energy shunts they used for stealth dimmed the light of the stars to barely discernible points in the blackness. The only frequency it wasn't sucking up right now was the color of Alcyone's light the Xihute hulls absorbed. Not much else reached the array running at full stealth like this. If the two systems were out of sync, then the whole Xihute fleet could be out there and they wouldn't know it.

  "With that scar of yours I don't even need the LiDAR," she said, "but you'll be happy to know it's working."

  "Any sign of friendlies? Can we flash them with the comms laser and get away with it?"

  "They're nice and dark, just like us," she said. "Why? You want to boss them around just because Devlin put you in charge out here, Commodore Bix?"

  "I was thinking of increasing our dispersion, Captain Em."

  She laughed breathy into the mic. "Just as long as you remember I own half this junk, loverboy. Devlin put you in charge of those two sloops, but any decision involving the Sajjada is half mine."

  "That's not how it works."

  "That is too how it works."

  "And I take the blame if we screw it up."

  "If we screw it up, you're dead anyway," she said. "And so am I."

  Adderley’s voice intruded on their private channel on local comms. "Getting intermittent flash contacts down here at the EWC, close...under 50,000 Ks out. I'm sending the tracks to your NAV."

  The tracks appeared like red strands running parallel past their position. "That has to be the Xihute," she said. "They're on course for the third planet."

  "Solid contact," said Adderly from below. "Multiple contacts. It's Xihute fighters. Six of them. Scouts probably. They won't be close enough to see us unless they pop a flare."

  "Good god," was what Adderly said when he sighted the sparkle of intermittent contacts in the fighters' wake. The feed from the EWC to the NAV was still open and all the tracks of the all the hundreds of individual new contacts appeared in the cockpit's display like a river rushing across the inner system at Otherworld.

  "Sort my targets, Adder."

  "On it..." The feed from the NAV changed, and they began to get real target discrimination as the arrays gathered photons to build an image. "Approximately 330 Xihute fighters, five warships. The battle carrier...It's one of the really big ones."

  Three minutes later, they could zoom in with their helmets and eyeball it themselves as it approached on the port bow. The great, crescent half-moebius of the battle carrier's 3.5K hull menaced as it steamed towards them. His helmet said it was 5 Ks across. Gunboat cruisers flanked her on either side, but they were dwarfed by her mass.

  "Nasty particle streams on those carriers," said Bix. "Goddamn can-openers can split a hull and they've got enough armor of their own that only a battleship can penetrate past the bays."

  Next to him, Em gestured in front of her helmet, pinching and expanding her fingers to zoom in further. "Those four light cruisers aren't much bigger than destroyers - we've taken those out before..."

  He could see her thinking about it. "Yup. We have. It took ten gun batteries to do it too. The second we fire, they'd light us up with a flare. It won't matter how evasively you fly after that. The fighters will have us." The Xihute fighters gave up running on drive coils then and lit their rear engines so they became like a swarm of little stars. They passed 4600 Ks in front of the junk's bow casting a greenish glow over the slender cruisers and the broad and monumental curve of the Xihute battle carrier. "Send what we've got as a burst transmission to the Doxy. They'll enter orbit in 47 minutes at this rate."

  She said, "Why can't you do it?"

  "I'm busy." He brought Sajjada's puny drive coils online. "I'm going to see if we can't get just a little closer as we follow them in. Hopefully, the others will take the opportunity as well."

  "I hope you know what you're doing," she said. "One close fusion det from one little torp and they'll spot us."

  Less than a minute before entering orbit over Otherworld's night-side clouds, the Xihute behemoth disgorged more fighters. It was hard to get a count, but Bix guessed it sortied four to five-hundred total before it arrived. When the Xihute launched the last of them, Sajjada was only 10,000Ks to the rear, close enough to see the engines from the snub fighters illuminate the battle carrier's bays and reveal the armored hulls of the invasion drop ships lined up like castle-keeps as they waited for launch.

  Hundreds of greenish engine flares ahead brightened together as the forward elements of the alien fighter wing picked up speed and entered orbit ahead of the warships and spread over the night side. Blacked out New Madras was invisible under the clouds, but they'd find it anyway. "Where the hell is the fire from the surface batteries? Are the Legion taking the day off?"

  "They're waiting until there's something better to shoot at than fighters. The big ships won't go low enough to bombard effectively until the fighters take orbital space on at least one side of the planet."

  "Bofor's Station is firing," said Adderly from below. This far out, it was hard to see the flashes from the railguns, but the passive radar picked up the track of the sabot spreads launched at the light cruisers. With the station in such high orbit they were too far out to score hits; the Xihute ships maneuvered out of the way of their spreads. As they fired again, a pair of the light cruisers diverted in that direction and loosed long-range fire. The faint and ghostly streams of accelerated charged particles drilled into the outer sections of the station, shaking its towers. After the two-second burst terminated molten metals ejected from the wounds and sprayed over the shipyards and the docks.

  The battle carrier, the heavy cruisers, and the remaining two light cruisers settled in over the planet, lit by the engines of the fighters protecting them as they scanned the surface for targets. "They'll open up any second" she said.

  The first salvos from the Xihute ships illuminated the tops of the clouds as they vaporized and drilled their way through the atmo, coated by burning sheaths of plasma the color of an Otherworld sunset. The flash from beneath the clouds flickered and flared. The guttering light twisted his gut as the beam walked across what he was sure was New Madras. They stabbed down at the penal colonies and Vichtland City. For long and torturous seconds the lights burned under the clouds in ten places at once. "If they wait any longer to fight back, there isn't going to be an Otherworld left to defend!"

  "New contacts!" shouted Adderly on comms. "Legion Orbital Fighters cl
osing from the other side of the planet."

  "There!" She almost broke her finger on the canopy pointing at the hundreds of pale blue engine flares clearing the western limb of the planet and accelerating behind the Xihute formation. "Here come the Penguins."

  The Legion's two-man, heavy fighters had retractable stub-wings for endo-atmo ops, a beak-like nose-mounted cockpit, and the ones flown by the Legion pilot trainees had been painted white on the belly and black everywhere else. This season's crop of roughly 850 pilot-trainees were still two weeks from graduation to nugget status, but they and the penguins were going into action early.

  "They see them now," said Em. Nearly all the enemy fighters cut high-gee turns to engage the Legion pilots before they had a chance to launch torpedoes or missiles at the drop ships.

  "There go the ground forces." The castle-keep drop ships slipped out of the carrier's two bays and dove at the surface of the planet. Within seconds, the first of the falling fortresses turned their bases to the planet and hit the atmo. One and then another and another were enveloped in fire for the final phase of their descent as they veered off to different targets. All he could see of them then was plasma, smoke, and steam. Shore batteries fired up at them, missing and hurling bright salvos of burning sabot and focused plasma up through the night clouds. It was spectacular, but it didn't stop them.

  "Legion pilots will be in range of the fighters in 27 seconds." His helmet picked them out and wire-framed them as he zoomed in to see them open up early. The Penguins sprayed streams of cannon shells from their turret mounted guns and split into two formations as they closed, ignoring the warships and concentrating on the Xihute fighters.

  The alien fighters evaded the sabot and shrapnel from the range-det shells with ease and slashed at the Legion pilots with coordinated fire from their small-bore particle streams, catching them in inescapable nets of fire as the pilots rolled and jinked and tried to go evasive to no avail. When no avenue of escape was left available to them, they disappeared in flashes from a quick det or were crippled or cut in half to tumble back down to the surface.

  Em said, "Do they always die that fast?"

  "The Xihute fighters are superior in speed, maneuverability and firepower."

  "What do our fighters have?"

  "Numbers."

  "Torpedoes out!" Cried Adderly. Two-hundred penguins from the rear of the Legion's formation launched together. Their Mk5 warspites flew through the debris and toward the enemy on different paths, cutting back on their lines of travel so hard and fast, the gunners aboard the Xihute warships couldn't catch them. Half the alien fighters diverted to intercept them, giving the penguin squadrons the momentary advantage they were looking for.

  They used their numbers to close in on the faster, more maneuverable Xihute from several sides at once, and Bix finally began to see the yellow-white detonation blooms of Xihute reactors cooking off under sabot fire. He smiled when he saw Ram Devlin had chosen that moment to steam the ragtag Otherworld fleet out from behind the second moon and engage the enemy.

  28

  Absolom's Revenge

  High orbit

  Ram wanted to keep Hank close so he commanded from the deck of his son's ship as the hastily rearmed Absolom's Revenge led a squadron of fifteen destroyers and cutters in pursuit of the two Xihute cruisers that had strayed from their pack. "This is Ram Devlin. All ships, railgun battery fire only. Save the warheads we've got for the heavies and the carrier. Hold your fire until I give the order." The acknowledgments came in his helmet as he looked starboard to UNS Uncas, the ship he'd piloted from the docks, now captained by Asa Biko. Past the flares from their nacelles he could see most of the squadron's ships. The transponders on the ones out of sight were projected in his helmet, appearing as ghosts over the deck or bulkheads of the cutter's bridge.

  Particle streams fired from the tower-mounted turrets on each of the approaching Xihute cruisers lanced his squadron. Two flashes caught his eye to starboard. "Hotjacket is hit," said Hank. She's lost a turret. "Solomon's ship, UNS Brewster..." He rose from the chair and looked to the ship's four o'clock. Ram followed the line of his gaze to Brewster, tumbling and jetting flames where the Xihute particle streams had cut across her flank and ripped her open. It was hard to see what was exosuits and what was debris because it was all wrapped in flame.

  "All ships, fire at will."

  Twin shudders came up the frame of the slender cutter as the bow railgun batteries pulsed their magnetic acceleration rings and hurled a dozen osmium-tungsten rounds at the two Xihute cruisers. Traces of the plasma trails from over 150 rounds crisscrossed the vacuum. "Impact in three," said Millet from tactical. The Xihute cruisers twisted their ships at the bow and blasted their aft sections to the other side with maneuvering thrusters to turn themselves onto a different line before the salvo arrived.

  The series of flashes popping off the Xihute hulls told him at least one team of gunners had correctly guessed which way the enemy would go, but the two cruisers showed no signs of slowing. The deck gave a shake with the next salvo that went out just before the Xihute fired into them again and the starboard side lit up. Out a few Ks across the vacuum, UNS Fidelia began to fall behind with a hole in her at midships and dark engines. Her guns kept firing.

  "The two Xihute are turning." said Millet. "They know they've been ambushed and they're in it deep now." The two Xihute cruisers came about together to fall back under cover of larger guns and loosed a salvo with their rear turrets.

  "What was that, seven impacts without penetration? That's some tough armor," said Hank from the command chair. "Glancing shots won't suffice."

  "They're losing time in the turn," said Ram, looking at Millet's display. "We can still get them before they're under cover of the heavies. NAV, come to 350 mark 12, correct for maximally decreasing range and bearing to the Xihute cruisers."

  "All ships, follow Absolom's line, accelerate to maximum, and have sabot ready to fire. We're turning this into a knife fight."

  The two cruisers were fast and could maneuver to avoid fire, but turning 180 degrees at the speed they'd built up approaching the orbital station involved enormous inertial gees and the tightest turn the two Xihute warships could make curved across 50Ks of space. Their fire was inaccurate during the fifteen second maneuver and he hoped the invertebrate slugs aboard those ships were pinned flat to the decks of their ammonia-filled compartments and bursting from the inertial gees.

  By the time the Xihute bows were pointed back at the planet, Devlin's Privateers were almost on them. Beyond the fleeing cruisers, the night side of Otherworld had erupted with the detonation flashes and weapons fire of the dogfight and the terrible glow under the clouds from the Xihute's impacting salvos, but all Ram, Hank and Absolom's crew saw now was the twin flares of the Xihute's engines. The two strips of flaring plasma exhaust on the ships they chased felt so close he wanted to get a rifle and shoot them out of the sky.

  "All batteries ready," said Millet. "Waiting for your order."

  There was just enough time for Ram to glance at Millet's tactical display and verify that the line of destroyers and cutters was, indeed behind them before he ordered, "10 to port, now, now, now. A moment later, the cruisers filled the windows to starboard as Absolom's Revenge passed them close.

  "Fire!, Fire!" shouted Hank. The ship felt as if it shifted sideways under his feet as both bow batteries and the one at the stern fired into the hull of the closest cruiser with minimal deflection to the shot. Since the ships were running almost parallel when they passed, the salvos penetrated with blinding flashes. At least one hit something vital. An orange blur of jetting fire shot from the alien hull before they were past.

  Only then, did Ram see the particle streams it fired, still raking the vacuum to port where they'd just been. They reached out for UNS Uncas, too, but Bolo's pilot shifted them the other direction in the last second of the approach and managed to wound the nearest cruiser enough to slow it. Dana and Yantic Falls fired the shots tha
t hit the aliens' reactor and filled their decks with fire. Her destroyer lost a good chunk of bow armor and a gun to the other Xihute cruiser before Chun ripped straight down its twisted hull so close that the splash from his batteries' hits peppered the outer hull of his own vessel. That salvo impacted with almost no angle, perpendicular to the enemy hull and every sabot blasted a molten-edged hole in the alien cruiser's side. It lanced out and stabbed at Tabotem at midships with two batteries, lacerating her and setting her adrift before the fire jetting from the alien's hull breaches told them the Xihute cruiser wouldn't fire again.

  The remaining Otherworld destroyers and cutters hurtled past the burning Xihute hulls and towards the dogfight for orbital supremacy that had spread across both the night and day sides of the planet. Reactor dets winked every few seconds. He recognized too few as dying enemy craft and was glad to see the fleet of a 96 small ships they'd armed with small, fast-tracking guns now descending to lend fire support and give the pilots of the Legion an advantage. He hoped they'd all be smart enough to stay out of range of the battle carrier and her escorts.

  As the enemy left the shadow of the planet, three Shediri corvettes and the remaining raiders from Margo's hive began their approach on the battlegroup with the sun at their backs. "The bugs' gunboats should come in range about the same time we do if we go over the pole," said Millet.

  Ram nodded to Hank and thumbed comms. "This is Devlin. All ships stay tight on Absolom. Those two little cruisers were our warmup. Now we knock out the rest of the escorts and hit that battle carrier. Ready all guns, load all tubes."