The Aurora shuddered beneath the impacts of enemy fire. On the bridge of the beleaguered ship, Jarod and Barnes cooperated from their stations to deal with the problems the attack was causing their beleaguered vessel.
"Damage report," Julia asked, desiring the update.
"Shields are still down and we've taken a hit to the port impulsor. From what I can tell, they're targeting our shield generators and engines." Jarod checked another screen.
"Hawk may have downloaded information from our systems during his prior incarceration in the brig," Meridina proposed. "The Avenger's fire is remarkably accurate."
"But no longer against us alone." Julia was observing closely while Shai'jhur's dreadnought and other heavy ships battered away at the Darglan-built battlecruiser. More and more fire from Hawk's ship was going toward them, not the Aurora, while the Dilgar fire was battering the Avenger's armored hull down. The other ship was resilient, but the lack of proper training and experience in the other crew was showing. Their maneuvering reflected what must have been a fear that going too far would leave their boarding parties isolated.
"Anything yet on those boarding parties?" Julia asked.
"Commander Richmond is already deploying security teams toward the brig," Meridina said. "Would you like me to go assist?"
The temptation was there. Meridina's skill set would make her invaluable to repelling the enemy. But she was also the First Officer, and had a critical role to play on the bridge given their combat situation. Ultimately Julia shook her head in the negative. "No. I need you here, Meridina. It won't do any good beating off the boarding parties if we lose the ship."
"Of course," Meridina said. A part of her felt it inappropriate to be here, to be in a chair relaying orders when her skills could be put to more active use. But she was no longer a Knight of Swenya, by her own decision, and by the same she had chosen to be Julia's First Officer. This was a consequence of those choices, and so she pushed those thoughts away.
I must trust Commander Richmond to do what she can, Meridina reminded herself, and she whispered a short wish, or prayer depending on one's point of view, for her former subordinate's success.
The ship's security teams were deploying, and Commander Richmond deployed with them. She was in action uniform and had a pulse rifle in her arms with the rest of Team A, now moving laterally across the ship on Deck 20. "Teams B and C, approach from Section H. D and F are coming from the aft," she said into the security teams' comms.
"Yes sir," was the answer.
The first indication of contact with the boarders was when they stumbled upon the prone figures of a damage control team. One of her people leaned over and scanned them with an omnitool. "They're still alive," the Asian woman said. "They were shot with a stun setting of some sort."
"That's awfully kind of our opponents," noted Richmond drolly. They'd behaved similarly a year before as well. "Mark them for a medical team. We're proceeding."
They continued toward the brig. One azure corridor after another passed by the team.
They nearly stumbled into the first strike team. The black clad humanoid figures came around a corridor just ahead of them. Their technique was sloppy to Richmond's eye; just moving in a mass, but they had at least been monitoring their sensors and knew her people were coming. They opened fire the same moment Richmond's people did.
The teams were nearly matched, seven on six with Richmond being the extra shooter on her side, but the exchange of fire proved even better for her. Blue pulses filled the space between the two teams. The first hits on either side were absorbed by personal forcefields, but only the first. Richmond's target went down. A cry beside her told her she'd lost one of hers.
The difference here was tactics. Richmond's people dropped to a knee, presenting a smaller target and stabilizing their aim. The other side didn't. Her people practiced concentration of fire, the others didn't. In the exchange that followed she lost one more member of her team, but they lost all but two. The last two finally ducked back into the corridor they'd emerged from. Richmond gestured and one of her people pulled a stun grenade. The object was the size of an orange and shaped like a control handle. The throw was practiced and precise. It hit the opposite wall of the corridor entrance and bounced further in. A bright flash of energy temporarily filled the air. Richmond glanced at her sensors and confirmed her targets were down.
She had a choice. Secure the boarders, or head on to the brig. Given the location of her people right now and the boarders, only the latter would let her arrive before they could take the brig. So she made that choice. "Team G, re-deploy to Section G Deck 20, marker is down. Secure prisoners."
"Yes sir," was the response.
She and her team continued on.
On the rooftop of the Dilgar cloning center on Tira, Tra'dur and Cat were finishing their examination of the explosives on the barrage gates. "It's an Octaazacubane compound meta-stabilized by secondary compounding with a biogel, Cat," she looked up, triumph flashing on her face before she fell back to a frown.
Caterina nodded at the result. Now that they weren't being shot at, she and Tra'dur were able to focus on the task at hand. "Octaazacubane. Hrm. I suppose we could synthesize a neutralizing compound. But I'm not sure my omnitool can replicate something like that."
"Besides, we'd have to hit every gate," said Lindstrom. Nearby Lucy was still on the Brakiri transport, making sure the pilot obeyed instructions. "If our new friend's correct, we don't have time for that. Any other options?"
"An electrical current would probably do it, if we could introduce one to the bombs."
"Correct, it could be destabilized by electrical current. That would deflag the explosive in a sub-order detonation. If we could control the electrical current supply we could control the detonation order and keep it from being strong enough to damage the gates," Tra'dur offered, scribbling some set of calculations onto a small notepad and handing it to Cat. "Now, how to introduce a current…"
Caterina looked over the calculations and checked the scan results again. "The gate," she said. "The gates and barrage, I mean. They're made of metal. But the water's brackish. Do the records show if they use a sacrificial anode to protect against corrosion?"
Tra'dur blinked. "Oh right. We have such little water on Rohric…" She had an armoured box of a little computer that could access the Tiran network, and leaned into the cover of the massive concrete of the building, delicately tapping keys across finger-pads and the click of retracted demi-claws. "Yes, the barrage motor-generator rooms also have the galvanic rig in them."
Cat grinned at that. "Perfect! If we can channel the necessary current into the wiring, we'll disable the bombs!"
"Galvanic lines are 'dumb' without a control circuit. We'd need to physically hook a pulse-modulator into the circuit or else hack and reprogram something already in the motor-generator room that's linked to their power supply."
"So we need to get over there," Lindstrom remarked.
"Well, we have one of their vehicles," Cat said. "We could fly there. They may not even realize it's us until we're already landing."
"That would still be a hot assault. The control centre is the perfect place to defend the charges from," Tra'dur said quietly, fingering a bandolier of grenades she had somehow picked up during the day. Unlike Cat, she was perfectly comfortable with weapons.
Lindstrom activated the comm line. "Anders, we think we have a plan to eliminate the threat to the gates. But we'll need enough firepower to take out whoever is watching the place."
"I don't have any Marines to spare," Anders said. "But I might have something for you. I'll send them up."
"I wonder what he means by that?" Cat wondered aloud.
She got her answer a few minutes later when the roof door opened again… and two big, bloodied Krogan in battle armor stomped onto the roof. "Uh… hi," Cat squeaked.
Lucy looked over from where she was monitoring their captive pilot. "So you're the biotic I sensed rampaging around earlier."
One of the two, a red-eyed Krogan, eyed the lightsaber in her hand. "And you're that Human the mercs were screaming about." He chuckled. "Name's Urdnot Wrex."
"Nakmor Drack," said the other Krogan.
"And you were working for the Brakiri," Lucy said.
Lindstrom looked somewhat bewildered at that, but said nothing.
"Key word there. 'Were'. So." Wrex flexed his arms. "Major Anders said something about a hot landing."
"Those are always fun," Drack added
"We're hitting the control center for the barrage," Lindstrom said. "So our science officers can execute a plan to disable the bombs on the gates."
"Ah. Good plan." Wrex cracked his knuckles. "I'm not the best swimmer, so I'm in."
"Prosthetics and water don't mix. So let's get this done," said Drack.
Tra'dur, saying nothing of the abrupt change of heart, shoved her hands into her tactical webbing and glanced quietly from Lindstrom to Cat. Her anxiety over placing trust for the city in the hands of defectors was reflected only in the way her small claws silently flexed. But there was no other way.
On the bridge of the Shenzhou, Li watched the Aurora endure another barrage from the attacking Drazi. "They're not working together very well," she observed.
"Evidently not, Captain," Commander Otiros said from his seat beside her. "The Drazi are going for the kill regardless of their allies' efforts."
"We can't let them." Li frowned at the thought of losing the Aurora. The officers of the other ship had saved her from the hell of prison and given her an opportunity to live the life her dear mothers would have been proud to see her live. She would not let them be lost, not to these genocidal maniacs. "Helm, interpose us between the Drazi and the port side of the Aurora."
At the helm, Lieutenant Tabitha Crosswell responded immediately. "Aye, Captain," she said, her English that of the New Lancaster colonies descended from the northern English counties. "Adjusting position."
"Full power to shields, every itam you can manage."
Otiros' order was echoed by the other Dorei on the bridge, Operations officer Lieutenant Commander Turam Ipigos. The blue-skinned, teal-spotted Dorei woman moved her slender fingers over the controls. "Shields are now at sixty percent."
"I'm locking on the next group, Captain," said Lieutenant Enrique Medrano. The tall Cebuano was quick to anticipate her by adding, "Firing."
Sapphire bolts erupted from the bow pulse plasma cannons of the Shenzhou. They were not as powerful as their counterparts on the Aurora and Avenger, but against the unshielded Drazi they proved nearly as lethal. One Sunhawk spun away, leaking atmosphere and flame. The second hit by Medrano's fire blew apart another. Torpedoes blew the wing off of a third.
The Drazi attack didn't relent. With the Shenzhou in the way, firing her phasers and plasma cannons rapidly to cover the Aurora, the Drazi commanders started to go around her. This proved fruitless as the rest of the ad hoc Alliance squadron met them as well. The Koenig, Eagle, and Heerman cooperated in pursuing the Drazi maneuvering around them. The Dorei and Alakin ships moved up above and behind the Shenzhou to help take fire and block off the Drazi approach vectors. The Tu'pam zipped around between them, pouring plasma fire where she could.
Challenged, the Drazi pressed their attack in greater numbers. Wave after wave of Drazi Sunhawks flew in, their weapons blazing with ruby light that constantly met the shields of the Shenzhou and the other ships. The Alakin warbird Yreep lost shields first. The Drazi fire striking the bare brown and yellow hull of the winged starship left wounds spewing flame and atmospheric gas in the moments before emergency forcefields or bulkheads could contain the hull breaches.
"Shields down to forty percent," Ipigos warned. "We're taking so much fire the shield generators are being overwhelmed. We're already taking bleedthrough damage. Armor self-repair systems fully engaged."
Li nodded and gripped the arms of her chair, as if to provide additional support combined with her harness. Otiros gave her a concerned look. "Captain, we may need to resume maneuvering soon."
"We have to hold position with the Aurora as long as possible," she replied. "Otherwise the Drazi may destroy them." Even as she gave the command, the ship shuddered again, with an entire squadron of Sunhawks unloading their strongest fire into the Shenzhou's shields.
"Shields down to thirty percent."
I will buy you as much time as I can, Julia, Li thought. That is all I can do.
Julia did not miss Li's efforts, and those of the other commanders. "Can we get shields back?"
"Too many generators are offline from battle damage," Barnes answered. "We've got repair crews doing what they can, but it's going to take a while."
The ship shook again. "They just took out a plasma emitter, starboard side," warned Angel.
The Avenger's fire on them was nevertheless light. Most of its fury was being directed at the Dilgar pentacon that had come to the Aurora's assistance. Julia watched the holo-viewscreen as plasma cannon fire from the big Darglan-built ship savaged one of the Tikrit-class ships in the Dilgar formation. "Keep fire up, as best as you can," she told Angel.
"It would help if we could get the bow cannons back on target."
"Sorry, but with the impulsor damage, we can't outmaneuver them," Locarno said.
"Do what you can, Commander," Julia said. She turned her head to Meridina. "Status of the boarding parties?"
"Three parties defeated so far. Commander Richmond will be arriving at the brig just ahead of one of the parties."
"Hopefully she can hold them until the other teams get to her." WIth that, Julia returned her attention to the battle over Tira.
Richmond and her team arrived at the brig. The two guards on duty there already had their weapons out and ready. Behind them, the prisoners were sitting quietly in their cells, observing with obvious interest.
"Defensive positions," ordered Richmond. "And seal the door. They'll be here any minute."
"You should probably let us go," Hawk said. "If my friends have sent who I think they've sent…"
"Your input is noted," Richmond answered. "And ignored."
"Your bruises and broken bones, lady," said Hawk. in the cell beside him, Helen snorted.
Richmond turned her attention to the door. The seal would take time for her opponents to work through, unless they used a blasting charge. Which had a time delay of its own anyway.
But the unexpected happened.
With a loud shriek of protest, the door began to slide open again. As if someone was physically forcing it open. Gloved fingers appeared in the gap that now formed between the door and the side of the doorway. Someone was gripping the door and forcing it open, in defiance of the seal and all of the inherent mechanisms made to prevent someone from doing just that.
An object popped in through the now-open doorway. "Grenade!" Everyone ducked behind the workstation or into the open cells in the second before the blast shook the area. An energy wave dissipated against Richmond's personal shield A stun grenade of some sort, little different than the one she had used earlier, but less potent.
"Fire!" she shouted. Her team, and the on-duty guards, opened up on the doorway. The burst of fire hit a figure who impulsively rushed in. After a personal shield absorbed a couple of shots the attacker went down.
Return fire came around the edges, fierce and heavy. Richmond and her people had to keep to cover themselves, although not so much that they couldn't keep the fire up.
And then another grenade flew in, and another… these went further than the first had. One landed at the opening of a cell that one of her people was taking cover in. There was nothing that officer could do at that point, and the stun grenade knocked him unconscious despite his shield.
The next figure that came in was shot at as well. But unlike the first, this one had a long, massive tower shield formed in front of him, off the same silvery material that Hawk and Helen had used earlier. This one was using the Darglan enhancement nanites to form a protective shield for himself. Richmond thought it clever, at least for a short-term advantage. In the long-term she and her guards could maintain fire and batter through the nanites.
As it turned out, they didn't have the time for that.
Behind their shielded ally, the rest of the enemy team was moving in with weapons out and firing. After an exchange off fire another of Richmond's people went down. She noticed it and frowned. She looked over their opponents and hid a grin. "Cover me," she demanded, and the guards nearest her nodded.
With the cover fire of two of her guards, Richmond emerged from cover and held her rifle steady. She aimed low, almost to the ground, and spotted when she thought she'd find. The shield maker hadn't made his shield quite long enough. It hovered about twenty centimeters above
the ground. That gave her sufficient room to aim as his foot. She pulled the trigger immediately.
The blue pulse hit the shield holder square in the foot. A shriek of pain and surprise came. The shield-holder lost their concentration,or something to that effect, and the shield lost its cohesion and retracted a bit. This opened up a second shot that hit the man in the lower leg, and a third. The shield-holder toppled.
But the others were in now. The enemy took cover in the nearest cells, or on the opposite side of the control station. One actually went up to it and started operating a multidevice. It wasn't hard for Richmond to guess what they were doing. "Take out their hacker!" she ordered, immediately trying to shoot the enemy in question.
Before she could, another of the dark-clad figures shot forward and grabbed her, or rather her weapon. She held on for dear life, intending to wrest control of her rifle back. Richmond was stunned when she instead was lifted into the air with her weapon. Her attacker was strong enough to lift her with one arm. She got a glimpse of his face. An alien of light skin that would be Caucasian on a Human. Thin ridges - bone ridges? - were on the temples above the alien's thin eyebrows. From the angle she thought she saw more ridges on the visible ear, which ended in a point reminiscent of Vulcanoids. He glared at her and moved, pulling her in a motion while he seemed to be trying to yank her rifle away from her.
A moment later she was flying across the room, her grip on the weapon lost. She slammed into one of her guards and they went down. When she looked back up she noticed the alien man picked up and tossing another Aurora security officer. This one went flying back into the forcefield of Helen's cell. Given the force with which the field was hit, it was no surprise he went down unconscious.
She still had a couple guards in the fight, and Richmond herself pulled her sidearm out. They could still win it, she felt, if they could bring the alien down before he tossed them all around.
Then Richmond saw they were out of time.
The hacker succeeded.
The forcefields over Hawk and Helen's cells dropped. The two jumped into action. Nanite material flowed from their wrists and formed blades. Hawk's blade was sharp and strong enough that when the guard he attacked tried to block it with his rifle, the blade cut it in two cleanly. He followed up with a kick that sent the officer to the ground with a broken jaw. Helen didn't give such a chance to her target, striking with enough force in a push that sent her foe flying. She looked to the others. "About time!"
"Get everyone off the ship, now," Hawk ordered. He was speaking into his multidevice. "We…"
Richmond was already firing at that point. One of her shots hit Hawk in the chest, sending him down. The other hit the strong alien and did the same.
Unfortunately, her next shot didn't manage the same on Helen. A howl of rage came from Helen at the impact of the shot on her shoulder, just above the heart. Instead of falling unconscious, she merely snarled and whipped a hand out.
Richmond never saw the blades in mid-air. She felt them first, powerful impacts that tore through material and flesh to embed themselves into her right shoulder and arm. The shock of the impact caused her right hand to fall away from her weapon. One-handed, her aim went off and she only managed a glancing shot on the enraged Helen, who seemed to shake off the impact against her side. Before another shot could be tried, Helen was in close-quarters. Richmond had to pull her hand back to prevent the swipe from severing it at the wrist.
Then the other arm came up. There was nothing the Aurora security chief could do to keep it from plunging into her belly. Pain shot up through her torso at being impaled through the belly and lower spine. Richmond slumped against the wall.
Enraged, Helen stabbed her again. This time the blade went into her chest, cutting through ribs to slice through Richmond's lung. She let out a harsh breath at that. Blood began to fill her lung the moment the blade was pulled away. And there was yet more pain as Helen's other arm came back in and a third stab punctured her other lung. The fourth stab was lower, then higher…
Richmond coughed up blood when she tried to speak, stopping any words from being articulate in the hacking sound. Her green eyes looked up at Helen's face. Pure rage burned in those gray eyes, the one mark of East Asian ancestry on Helen's face, which was twisted into a ferocious, hate-filled snarl. But before the sixth stab could land, the strong alien grabbed her arm. "She's down," he said. "We've got to get back. The ship's taking a hammering."
"Fine." Helen's voice was a growl. She seemed to struggling against her temper. "Is he okay?"
"He'll be fine when we get him back to the ship," was the alien's answer. "We have to go. Now."
Helen looked down at her blood-soaked blades. One shifted shape and became a visible comm device. "Helen to Avenger. Get us out of here."
Richmond watched them disappear in flashes of white light. Darglan transporter signatures. When she tried to breath out, blood bubbled from her mouth.
At that point, she lost consciousness.
The commandeered Brakiri troop transport was approaching the barrage dam. In the rear loading area Lindstrom's security team finished final weapons checks. "What'll we do about him?" Lindstrom asked Lucy, gesturing to the pilot.
"We have an understanding," Lucy said from her place at the back of the piloting compartment. "Once we land he's going to give me his sidearm and leave."
"He's just going to raise his boss and tell them where we are."
"They'll know something's up with this thing anyway," Drack said. "The only thing he'll tell them is what they'll already know."
"What can we expect in terms of defenses?" Lindstrom eyed the approaching structure. They were maybe fifty seconds from a landing point.
"Human and Brakiri mercs," Wrex said. "The guard party for the control room. They won't have the arming codes for the bombs, though. Greden'll have the trigger, and he's probably across town in his HQ." Wrex pulled his shotgun from hits mounting place above his tail. The large weapon automatically extended to firing mode.
"A Claymore." Reubens' awe was evident. "I've always wanted to fire one of those."
"Hey knock yourself out." He offered the weapon. "The interesting part is when the recoil breaks your arm," Wrex added, grinning.
The grin turned into a chuckle at the look that crossed Reubens' face. Wrex withdrew the weapon a moment later.
"Landing now," the pilot reported. His voice made it clear that whatever happened, all he wanted to do was run.
The transport craft hovered to a landing on a cloud of dust and debris. One of Lindstrom's security personnel, Petty Officer Mreep, slid into the control chair for the support gun. The Alakin officer brought the barrel into position to provide fire support.
The moment the craft was landed, the pilot released his harness and jumped out the door to his left. He ran away from his craft and their destination, as expected.
"Let's move, people!" Lindstrom ordered, jumping off with pulse rifle up. The others followed, Wrex and Drack in the lead and Lucy remaining in position to protect Caterina and Tra'dur.
The control center was set into the middle of the barrage dam's structure, attached by a spit of landfill to the rest of the colony. Their landing site was on that spit, roughly thirty meters from the front door.
They made it twenty meters before the first shots rang out.
Ruby bursts erupted from the ground in front of Lindstrom. PPG fire. He reacted the only way he could in his open position; he started to run. The snap-hiss of Lucy's lightsaber sounded to one side. Beside him, Wrex was covered in the dark light of biotically-formed dark matter, a protective field that would take a few shots before it dissipated.
Mreep opened fire a moment later. The pulse cannon now under her control spat pulses of orange light into the control center's outer wall, and the windows being used as firing positions. The suppressive fire had its desired effect. The fire against them slackened.
They got to the door. Lindstrom's plan had been to kick it in, or blow it open. Urdnot Wrex had his own plan. A surge of biotic power struck the door and dented it in. It didn't come off its track entirely, however.
At least, not until Wrex slammed into it.
His shotgun thundered a moment later. There was a scream, calls for backup, and Lindstrom was inside with the Krogan. Fire was collecting on Wrex's biotic field. It wouldn't last more than another second or two. Lindstrom used that second to open up with his own pulse rifle. Blue bolts erupted, WHUM WHUM WHUM, and found a Brakiri merc in body armor. The merc went down regardless. The slacking fire bought time for Wrex to find momentary cover in front of the security desk near the door.
Drack entered next. His assault rifle swept in the opposite direction, toward a metal-backed door. Lucy swept an arm out and it opened, revealing a corridor of offices beyond where more mercs were hiding to evade the pulse cannon of the transport outside. Drack's assault rifle thundered a second before they could react. Two of them went down before the others could get to the protective cover of the offices in the hall.
But the direction that interested them was beyond the security desk. More fire came from that direction. They might have hit Drack from behind if not for Lucy, now working on deflecting fire back toward the shooters. With more of Lindstrom's people coming through the door, and Wrex popping up again to fire another shot from his massive cannon of a shotgun, they soon had enough fire and protection to move forward. "Opam, Bower, on that door, watch our back," Lindstrom ordered.
"Yes sir." The two security officers took up their positions with the desk as cover, freeing Drack to join Wrex again.
Beyond the security desk was another hall. The mercs they'd shot were in the open; the others had scrambled into the secured offices beyond. As they moved through Wrex and Drack cleared the offices like hardened veterans. Lindstrom was awed by the way the two Krogan moved with tactical finesse. Drack would open the door, Wrex would throw in a bolt of biotic force guaranteed to send anyone inside flying, and then either of their shotguns would ring out once or twice. Lindstrom figured it would have taken his full security team twice the time to clear their way down the hall, and that was if they were moving quickly and not concerning themselves with potential casualties.
They reached the control center for the dams to find the mercs had turned it into their hardened defensive point. "Allow me," Lucy said to the two Krogan. With what seemed like suicidal confidence she stepped forward, lightsaber in hand, and went into the kill zone. Any other human being would have died. Even the two Krogan would have faced so much fire they might have gone down. But with the powers at her direction, the speed at which she could move, all of the fire in the world couldn't stop Lucy. Her lightsaber was a sapphire blur in the air, catching seemingly every shot (certainly every one that could have actually hit her). Within a few moments she was at the first of the mercs. A swing of her weapon, a cry, and two dismembered arms and a rifle hit the ground. Without even looking towards them, Lucy sent two flying in a wild, unfocused surge of power.
"Huh." Wrex glanced to Drack. "Impressive."
"Yeah," agreed Drack.
With that exchange the two Krogan went in to join her. Behind them, Lindstrom kept Cat and Tra'dur back, allowing the two science officers to watch as the Krogan and Lucy worked together to clear the room. It didn't take long, between the fury of the Krogans' firearms or the speed and raw power at Lucy's disposal.
When the last of them went down Lindstrom tapped his omnitool. "Mreep, Liu, come in."
"What about this transport?"
"Blow it," he ordered.
By this point Cat and Tra'dur were heading to the controls. "This shouldn't take too long," Cat said.
"Whatever happens, we'll hold," answered Lindstrom. "Just make this work."
"I've modified this sensor pack to work as the modular, but Cat, I need you to interface with your multitool to figure out the length of the galvanic wires. We have to know the length to calculate the signal pulse modulation." The latter was for the benefit of Lindstrom and the Krogan. "If we get the energization pulse off we could end up destroying the gates ourselves." Tra'dur knelt down with a bit of trembling freneticism finally showing through.
"I'm already calculating that, getting scan results to make sure," Cat said.
"How much longer?"
"Not long," Cat answered Lindstrom.
They were answered by the explosion outside. Lucy looked to the window looking out over the vehicle lot. The transport they'd used was a burning wreck, as was planned.
The group of Blood Pack mercenaries beyond it? Not as planned.
"Well, you may want to hurry up all the same," she said. "We've got company."
They had locked down the bridge's access to the ship controls and left the Huáscar floating still in space, and now, they were nearly to the end of their journey. Zhengli Varma could feel the burn in her lungs of a strenuous exertion, of a series of desperate fire-fights that had brought them this far. She flexed her fingers around her PPG and nodded, looking about her little group. "Just one lunge left, and we will have the bridge. Everyone ready? Simmons, Glenkov, you will give us covering fire from that junction, Saumarez, do what you can, you are doing great, but do not kill yourself doing it. Watters, you are with me. We will take the security station and then I shall override the blast doors. Questions?"
"No sir!"
"No, sir!" they echoed.
Elia smiled, tho' her expression was dreadful, wiped her nose, and reached out. "I'm ready, Captain."
"Take it easy, Saumarez. I mean to get my crew through this, and that damned well includes you, Ensign." She cracked a smile. "Battlefield commission. They can court-martial me for violating the MRA later." She tugged part of her insignia off of a shoulder-strap, and offered it. "All right, thirty second count on my mark."
The surge of pride as she took the insignia and affixed it was as intense as the one that Zhengli had seen on her comrades, felt herself, as they turned out at West Point to go straight to fighting the Minbari. She took her position with a tight little smile on her face that said all it needed to.
"Mark." She took a few deep breaths, flexing her hands again, letting the pounding of her heart fade into the background, as she softly counted down. "Now!" The rifle came up, and she was moving to rush the control station, plasma blasts streaking out as she fired from the hip. I joined the Fleet, not the GROPOS!
It was a rapid fusillade of fire from her people, but there were only four defenders at the post, and Elia took them on in warfare both mental and physical while Corporal Watters led point. They were pushing themselves to the limit, but in doing so, they ended it in seconds. The wounded and dead lay around the post, and Zhengli was at the control station. It read an internal override lock, but as Captain she still had the code for that.
"Breaching positions!" She placed her people in what-cover was available, then keyed in the override herself. "Weapons down, now!" She half-screamed, already charging through the door before the crew inside could react. Let it end, please, I do not want to kill any more of my crew!
Inside was a charnel house, at least eight dead. One of the sensor techs, who had been unarmed and kept their heads down during the fighting on the bridge, was bandaging the Bosun's Mate who had somehow survived. A few others were manning their posts, looking up in varying degrees of shock and relief as Zhengli stormed onto the bridge with her pistol. There was Foster, there were several other officers with Nightwatch backgrounds… Several of his men who had the same background.
Dead in varying degrees of squalor and PPG burns.
And there, toppled over the command chair, with twelve pulses scouring his body but his handsome, almost pretty young face intact, was James Reichert, pale and almost graceful in death, like some 19th century painting of war rather than the real thing.
"... Ah, James…" She stepped forward, and gently lowered him down to the deck herself, closing his eyes and shrugging off her jacket to place it carefully over his face. "Rest well, kshatriya, your duty is done and well." She murmured it in soft tones to herself, before standing to press the comm controls; "This is Captain Varma, I am in command on the bridge once again. Major Foster and his mutineers here are dead. Those of you who remain, surrender immediately and you will be returned safely to Alliance space upon the end of these hostilities. You have sixty seconds to comply."
The comm-line from engineering opened. "Captain, this is Commander Farallon. I've got engineering down tight and most of the aft spaces as well. What are you going to need from me?"
"Combat power, Commander. The battle is going poorly for our side, and we are going to have to bring Huáscar into the line as soon as we can."
"Bringing the reactor to combat output now, Captain," a grim, resigned, and exhausted voice answered. "We're with you. But God, it's the Civil War all over again."
"Worse, Commander. Worse. Stand to your duty, Commander, it is all we can do." She glanced down at the shrouded figure lying at her feet. "As soon as security reports the ship is secure, we will be clearing for action. Make ready, everyone."
Elia was standing by the sensor deck, with its techs still alive and now resuming their duties as the Bosun's Mate was carried away on a stretcher. Corporal Watters took up his position even though she was a Marine.
As she did, Elia turned to Zhengli. "I'm not sure we have the time. That big Dilgar dreadnought is taking a pounding from the pirate battlecruiser. If we hold engineering, the computer core, and the bridge, we can operate the weapons off remote, right? We should call stations now. And it might make the enlisted go to their stations even if they were fighting us, for fear of an alien attack. They don't need to understand, just obey."
The Sinic woman bit her lip, staring at the tactical display for a moment, before she gave a single sharp nod. "Corporal Watters! Sound Battle Stations! All hands, this is the Captain! Lay to your battle stations, Huáscarenos, we are going into action, this is not a drill or a trick! Clear for action and all pilots to your fighters!"
Elia took position next to the sensor operators. She didn't know what to do, but she could sense when the operators felt they'd found something important. That would have to be enough, for the paucity of regular officers. After five painful minutes they finished working to stations, shields up and about half of their fighters successfully launching.
"Helm, new course, zero-six-five mark zero-two-zero relative, all ahead standard. Bring interceptors and shields online. Battery control, give me that enemy battlecruiser, both main beams!"
"...Locking.. Locked on target, Captain!"
Elia's eyes widened and she snapped to address Zhengli before the sensor operator could open his mouth to report to her. "Their shields are down, Captain, we've got a chance to get the drop on them!"
"Everything, missiles, plasma cannons, particle beams, now! Alpha strike them, immediate!" Her orders snapped out to fire control, and she leaned forward in her seat.
"Aye Aye, Captain! Firing!"
As the Avenger came about from recovering her boarding parties from the Aurora, she was abruptly struck by the full power of the Huáscar's batteries. The two main beams were powerful enough to heel her on her beam-ends, burning massive streaks down the Darglan armour with raw power to make up for their want of finesse, leaving weapons turrets wrecked and smashed, the Avenger's defenses having been hit so hard by so many weapons that finally major systems were being smashed and destroyed with no protection from shields or armour.
"Burn, you pirates… keep firing, maximum cycle rate! They will recover, but we can do them real hurt until they do!"
As the Huáscar kept firing, the big Dilgar dreadnought, the Magaratha, pulled herself out of a dead spin as one of her starboard engines came back. Thrusting into formation with the two Sekhmets, the three ships all that remained of their pentacon, they swung back toward the Avenger… And opened fire with renewed intensity.
"Magaratha, keep to our port! We can cover you with interceptors!" Her voice snapped out in Dilgar, as her eyes watched the display and she smoothly switched back. "Where are my fighters? Fire control, watch those Sunhawks on the starboard! Take them with the flank cannons! Hard to starboard! We have nowhere near won yet."
"Nineteen fighters forming into coverage against missile fire, we don't have pilots for the rest yet, Captain!" One of the comms ratings confirmed.
"Engaging as ordered," weapons repeated back.
Elia looked up from the tactical display. "Sir, the Avenger is bringing her shields back up, but the energy trace already suggest localized failures. They've taken serious internal damage."
"Keep hitting them," Zhengli said tautly. Ahead of them the Avenger was coming about. They'd pay for it.
With the Huáscar's precipitous attack on the Avenger, the situation for the heavy pentacon, which had seen one Tikrit destroyed and another disabled by the Avenger's fire had abruptly changed. The accumulated damage had been so great as to temporarily cripple the Magaratha and destroy one Tikrit with another damaged when, abruptly, the tremendous forward batteries of the Huáscar had gored the Avenger like a lion on its meat.
"Warmaster, Huáscar has joined the fight! She's hitting the Avenger, hard!" Kaveri Varma's heart soared - her daughter must have retaken her ship, and brought her into the line without hesitation.
"Warmaster, we're receiving a request to conform movements with the Huáscar, they need cover from the Drazi attacks on their flank."
"Do so," Shai'jhur ordered. She was hiding her own grin. Little Zhengli had been a name known to her for decades. There was something in her triumph which naturally thrilled the soul.
"I knew she could, Kaveri," Shai'jhur said softly, and in English, to avoid breaking the tempo of the bridge, before switching back to Dilgar. "Now we need to finish this fight. What's the status of the Drazi squadrons?"
"Pressing hard, Warmaster. We are on the verge of being overwhelmed in all sectors." She kept her voice level, but the tactical plot had very little good news to offer.
"Detach the Sekhmet section to reinforce the main body. Direct them to conform to Captain Ming-Chung's movements, she is in the best place to operate with them. I want to hammer the Avenger to pieces but we can't lose the battle just to see it done."
"Understood, Warmaster. Our own damage is becoming critical, though the repair parties are working to restore what they can."
"Here, I have an idea…" Her eyes suddenly gleamed. "Detach them. Summon another ship from another direction to surprise them instead. It will be worth two battlecruisers locked in a turning battle."
Ahead of them the Avenger, wreathed in the fire of her interceptor grids, was half covered in scars, but still a fighting warship. Shai'jhur intended to shortly remedy that.
Commander Abebech Imra was her own little legend in the Alliance military forces. With a pair of dictator shades, and a resume an arm long claiming she had fought for pretty much every decent regime within a hundred light-years of the Fracture, she had an isolated, rock-solid crispness that belied the Alliance stereotypes of S0T5. A few weeks after the constitution had been signed, she showed up and signed up for the Alliance Navy.
After serving on a succession of large ships, she had been the Operations Officer on the dreadnought MacArthur, shot down deep in the Reich during a major counteroffensive. Two hundred and eight survivors from the isolated squadron had been rounded up by Imra and told to hide. Somehow the SS patrols had failed to find them and their evasion and recovery had saved their lives, considering what the Reich did to alien and non-white POWs. She'd been given the Heerman after that, and in three months already made her mark
Even now in the heat of a battle that they had started while outnumbered almost three-to-one, the Old Woman was as calm and inscrutable as ever underneath her glasses. (She did smile when they called her that, though.) The battle raged all around, and her soft-spoken orders came only when necessary, directives to a well-drilled crew.
Her Helmswoman, Lieutenant Sarah Jenkins, glanced back to see her glancing at the tactical holo, the light from it illuminating the deathly pallor on her black skin, her hands clad in sharp gloves, as ever. There were times when the Old Woman came off as scary as hell, and serving under her was definitely an acquired taste.
"Helm, seventy-five degrees to starboard, nose up twenty-five, full impulse," she said in precise English with a hint of Ethiopia slipping through, or wherever it was, since Ethiopia hadn't existed for thousands of years in her home universe.
"Aye, Captain. Coming about.." She obeyed as the Heerman peeled to the Koenig's port.
Imra's hand shifted and the tactical holo flashed. "Torpedoes fire on designation," she ordered as the designated target flashed for weapons. It was a Sunhawk trailing drive gas. The torpedoes lanced out and found the wound that had already been made. They burned bright in the flash of impact, and the ship's drives went completely dead, crippled and spinning off as a hulk.
"Come about to starboard," she ordered. "Then form on the Koenig again."
"Weapons, target the enemy fighters," she added a moment later, addressing the lithe Turkish man at the weapons station.
"Aye, Captain!" Lt. Abdulmehmet's answered with alacrity now and a hasty salvo of forward weapons onto the crossing targets smashed four of the large and ill-manoeuvring Drazi fighters.
"Message from the Magaratha, Captain! They are engaging the Avenger in tandem with Huáscar; the enemy's shields are down, they need any help possible."
"Before she can withdraw… And the Huáscar has switched sides again. How apropos." It was an unusually extensive statement in combat from Imra. She keyed her tactical link. "Commander Apley, I aim to come about hard to starboard and thread through that central group of Drazi. I'll be on the Avenger then and she's uniquely vulnerable to an assault ship from the port quarter. Please cover me."
"Clear, Commander. Forming to your port to engage the Drazi Centre…"
Sarah though her Commander approved of Apley. The orders rolled out sharp and precise, and they ran the gauntlet at close range, sweeping through unshielded opposition toward the stunningly battered hull of the Avenger.
"Weapons, target the port nacelles and fire."
With that freedom, Abdulmehmet laid in the coordinates for the upper nacelle and opened fire with their full batteries. Lancing across the field in a strafing run, while the Avenger was engaged with the massive Dilgar warship and the huge Huáscar, a limping Aurora sweeping around to strike them from starboard, they now had the enemy boxed in.
The crew of the Avenger had just begun to charge their warp drives to escape when the concentration hit the nacelle. Piercing the ablated and wrecked self-repairing armour, it dug deep. The result was thoroughly dramatic. The upper left nacelle exploded.
"Cover us behind the dreadnoughts!" Imra snapped.
Sarah drove them on a pinwheel course up and under the Huáscar to evade fire from the veritably crippled Avenger, while behind them, the Aurora again opened fire.
Commander Imra clapped a gloved hand into gloved fist, and other than that, was as calm as ever.
The change in the tide of battle with the Avenger changed the mood on the Aurora bridge. With the Huáscar in the fight and the Heerman's attack run crippling the battlecruiser's warp cability, the Aurora was in position to finish her foe off. "I don't want them escaping," Julia said. "Target the likely location of their jump drive and fire."
"Firing now," Angel said, enthusiasm in her tone.
One by one, the plasma emitters and cannons on the starboard side of the Aurora lit up, scouring the same side on the Avenger. The battlecruiser strove to return fire with her own weapons, and where she hit the Aurora's unshielded hull was being blackened and broken. But with the fire of the Huáscar still on Avenger, and Magaratha supporting, the Avenger was in deep trouble, and her fire was clearly slacking from loss of power.
"Perhaps we should offer them the chance to surrender," Meridina proposed.
"Knowing them, they won't take it," Julia said. "But for form's sake…"
"Putting you on," Jarod said.
"Vessel Avenger, this is Captain Andreys of the Aurora," Julia said. "If you surrender now you won't be harmed. We will take you into Alliance custody." That was important. Julia already knew Shai'jhur wanted to execute Hawk and his allies, and Zhengli might feel the same way. Both saw Hawk and his people as no more than pirates. "You've lost this fight. Dragging it out just results in more of your people dying."
The Aurora shook again. Avenger was still firing. "More hull breaches, Decks 14 through 17 and 19 through 25," Jarod said.
"Armor self-repair is down to 80% effectiveness," Barnes added. "Damage has exceeded capacity."
"I think that was your answer, Captain," Angel noted. "I've got a target lock with torpedoes."
"Fire," Julia ordered.
The Aurora had come around enough to put her bow launchers on the Avenger. Two spreads of eight solar torpedoes fired from the launchers. With her weakened interceptors Avenger had no hope of stopping even a quarter of the torpedoes. The resulting hits blew chunks out of their drive and primary hulls. One torpedo impacted on the upper starboard warp nacelle and blew it apart. Flame and wreckage spewed from the wounds in the other ship, exceeding its armor repair systems' capabilities with the level of damage suffered. It was plainly evident to all that the Avenger was finished.
Even to the crew of the ship, apparently, given it moved to break from Tira. The Huáscar and Shenzhou, the latter damaged as well by her fight with the Drazi, both maneuvered to cut her off. More weapons fire carved into the Avenger.
"I'm picking up a particle charge," Lieutenant al-Rashad said. "They're opening a jump point."
"I'm trying to get their drive, but their drive hull's got internal armor or something," Angel said. "I don't think I can hit them enough."
Nevertheless she tried, as did the other ships. By the time the green vortex formed ahead of the Avenger, she was a burning, flaming wreck of a starship. With what seemed like a last gasp of power, her drives powered up and she flew into the jump point. Torpedoes from the Shenzhou and missiles from Huáscar pursued, hitting both the vortex and the Avenger even as she surged into the maw of the vortex. The point began to destabilize from the impacts. It was beginning to collapse.
Too late, however, to stop the escape of the Avenger.
"Where did they jump to?" Julia asked al-Rashad.
"I'm analyzing the jump point now, I think it was Universe A4P5."
Julia sighed at that. From this point in space, the spatial aspect of their jump would be unlikely to carry them into range of Alliance space in that universe. Even if the Alliance could spare the ship to vector in, they'd probably be gone, back to their Darglan Facility, by the time the ship got there.
"Status on the other ships? Could they jump and pursue?"
"I would not recommend it," Meridina said. "All ships report moderate to heavy damage. Only the Heerman and Greepk have warp capability currently."
"And there are still at least sixty Drazi ships out there, with another forty or so ships from the other League species," Jarod added. "And I'm sure they're pretty mad."
"So no pursuit." Julia muttered "Damn" under her breath. This incident had proven yet again just how dangerous Hawk and his people could be. With any luck they'd be out of action for months fixing their ship. And frying their brains trying to learn more to fix it more quickly, or to refit it… how much more powerful will they be when they show up again?
That consideration was for later. Julia forced herself to set it aside and focus on the present. "What about the Colony?" she asked. "Have they blown the gates yet?"
"No," Jarod said. He blinked. "And they may not get the chance. I'm picking up several of our people at the gate control center for the barrage. Including Lieutenant Delgado and Combat Master Tra'dur. And it looks like they're being besieged by some of the mercenaries."
Julia noted the worry that now showed on Angel's face. "Have security beam a team down as soon as they can."
"It's going to be a bit," said Barnes. "Our transporters are down from battle damage."
"See if any of the other ships can help," Julia ordered. "We need to make sure that barrage stays intact." Even as she gave that order, she knew that whether or not they could get help down, the survival of Tira was down to Cat and Tra'dur.