"Battle stations!" Wildstar commanded.
The main lights dimmed, and the familiar klaxon sounded, red lights flashed throughout the ship. Cosmo Tiger pilots jumped up from their ready room and slid down the quick tubes that quickly deposited them into the launch bay. Almost as quickly, each pilot found their plane, and began performing pre-launch checks. Gunners climbed into position behind the controls of each antiaircraft gun, within each turret gunnery teams of four climbed into their chairs. Deep in the heart of the ship, additional crews ran to man the side missile tubes, while other crews manned the torpedoes and depth charge launchers.
"All gunnery stations manned and ready, Cosmo Tigers ready to launch." Sakagage reported to Row.
Looking up from his preliminary targeting solutions, Row turned to Captain Wildstar. "All combat stations are ready, Captain."
In the engine room, fresh engineers rushed in through the main doors and their own tubes, every station was manned, and the Wave Motion Gun made ready, incase it was called upon. The engineers quickly made sure the engines were ready to operate at peak efficiency, the moment they were needed.
"The engine room is ready, Captain." Orion reported.
"Navigation systems check OK, Captain." Venture said.
Blast doors closed throughout the ship, segmenting the hallways into smaller sections, and sealing each compartment. In the sickbay, Doctor Sane was busy barking orders at Nurse Acre and the rest of the staff, to make sure the sickbay would be ready when it was needed, and then casually fixed himself a small drink. Kei, in hydroponics, double-checked the seals on the water system, and made sure the blast shields that had closed around each plant potter were secure so that if the room was exposed to space, all of the plants would survive. Knox made sure his marines were in their staging rooms, so they would be ready to board, repel boarders, or act as damage control as needed. IQ-9 made the rounds of the ship on his own, his internal communications and sensors tuned to the bridge so he would be able to go to wherever he was needed most at any given moment. In the kitchens, the last of the food stores were fastened down, and the cooking staff busied themselves on preparing lunch for the crew; each meal would be prepared for delivery to the various duty stations.
Sandor turned to Wildstar, "All ship stations report ready, Captain."
Next to Sandor's station, Lucas looked over at his superior, "I almost hoped we wouldn't find them."
Wildstar gave each crewmember a quick glance. They were all ready, although Zandra looked very nervous. Although Wildstar knew that she was just the only one who was actually showing her feelings. He would be more worried if her role was more combat oriented.
"Have they noticed us?" Wildstar asked.
"Negative. There is no change, they are just sitting there," Eager answered.
Could it be a trap, Wildstar wondered. Only one way to find out for sure. "Let me know if there is any change."
The Worldship was in orbit around the second planet of the system. The system included 4 planets around a red sun. Wildstar hoped that the solar flares were playing hell with the enemy's radar, but he couldn't count on that. Should he try to approach them from the sun, or attempt to come around and trap the enemy between themselves and the sun? The third planet was the answer… if the enemy had not yet seen them, they could come up behind the third planet and be much closer to the enemy Worldship, then they should be able to trap the ship in the system. "Full combat speed to the third planet."
"Aye, sir." Venture answered, pushing the throttle controls to maximum, and adjusting the heading with the flight stick. Venture had no doubts now and for the moment forgot he hated his captain.
Row did not allow himself to feel anything. He focused entirely on his target, waiting for it to come in range, and his captain's order to fire.
The ploy did not work. "Worldship is powering up their engines," Sandor shouted.
Wildstar found himself standing, and took a moment to tell himself that it was now someone else's job to man the combat station. "Row, fire a warning shot… let them know we are not ready for them to leave. Venture, forget the third planet, angle us at the Worldship."
Yamato's first turret fired, its three energy beams wrapping around each other to form a single beam of powerful destructive energy. The beam cut in between the Worldship and the empty space it was attempting to reach.
"Launch Cosmo Tigers, don't let that ship leave this system."
Just below the Yamato's auxiliary engines, the launch platform lowered and plane after plane launched into the vastness of space. Each plane immediately fell into formation before looping around towards the Worldship.
"Our fighters are moving around to cut the enemy off… they are outside our line of fire." Sakagage reported.
"They are trying to move away," Eager said.
"Get us more speed. Row, keep firing at them, don't let them keep a set course," Wildstar ordered.
Looking intently ahead, Venture pulled the lever to adjust the ships speed, and made another slight adjustment to the ships heading. The ships engines flared to life, propelling the ship ever faster.
Row made his own adjustments to his control panel, and then trusted to the individual gunners to make the fine adjustments. Each of the three front turrets fired, their beams arching past the Worldship, each one forcing the Worldship to alter course away from its escape, which slowed the Worldship down.
Lord Malathin marched onto the bridge of the Worldship, and took a quick look at the tactical displays, before giving Cyani a nasty look. "Cease all evasive action. Set a straight course out of the system."
"But, Lord, we are under attack!"
"They are not trying to hit us, most likely they hope to get their people back intact. Their fire is intended to slow us down so they can trap us in the system."
"Enemy fighters closing!"
An explosion echoed through the ship, and rocked the bridge. "What was that?"
"An attack on our secondary propulsion system."
"Why haven't our fighters already launched? Launch our fighters immediately, and contact the fleet for help." Malathin commanded.
The first wave of Cosmo Tigers peeled away from the Worldship after making their first attack run. Their retreat from the Worldship also served to draw enemy fire, as fighters began launching from the Worldship.
The second wave of Cosmo Tigers targeted the enemy fighters and landing bays with missiles and strafing runs. Most of the second wave of Cosmo Tiger attacks had to be aborted as the Worldship's anti-aircraft guns opened fire. Two of the Cosmo Tigers exploded under the barrage.
"Now, they are slowing us down." Malathin observed. He knew full well that there was no way his fleet would be able to send support ships to his aid any time soon, and the Worldship's weapons were not large enough to be a match for a battleship. Instead he would have to use cunning to escape. "Connect me with the commander of the attacking ship."
On the Yamato, Wildstar's frustration grew when the enemy captain had figured out that he did not wish to damage the Worldship. If not for the Cosmo Tigers harassment, the Worldship would have already escaped. The Yamato only needed to get a little closer before they could accurately use their main guns to destroy the enemy's engines without causing any substantial damage to the rest of the ship. Then he would have to risk an invasion force, which he really did not want to do. When they had invaded the Comet Empire, their losses had been unacceptably high, but he knew his Space Marines would be up for the challenge.
"The enemy commander wants to speak with you, Captain." Yumi said.
For some reason, that worried Wildstar. "Don't let up on any of our attacks. Put him through, Yumi."
The image of Malathin appeared on the Yamato's main video panel, his expression was smug and confident. "I am Lord Malathin of the Lupries Worldship, I assume you feel your assault on my vessel is justified?"
"I am Captain Derek Wildstar of the Earth ship Yamato. You raided our planet and took several of our citizens. If you return them, we will cease our attacks."
"Lets see… Earth. Ah, yes, you mean the human population. Of course, if that is all you wanted, you should have said so from the beginning. You are welcome to them." Malathin then broke the connection.
"One of the domes has just broken off of the Worldship." Eager shouted, "Its headed for that sun."
"What!? Cease-fire. Venture, change course to intercept that dome!" Wildstar franticly ordered. How could the enemy do such a thing? At least they weren't just spacing their captives, but this way they were making sure he was too busy rescuing the hostages to prevent the Worldship from escaping.
Venture franticly worked the control sticks to change course, and then he had to take evasive action to avoid ramming the dome as it passed them on its way to the sun.
"Row, fire the rocket anchor into the side of that dome! Stop the ship!"
Row hesitated slightly, unsure exactly where the control was, but once he found it, he responded quickly. He rotated the control to aim it at the rapidly passing dome before firing the anchor.
On the side of the ship, the anchor folded into a more aerodynamic arrow shape, exposing jets as it angled away from the hull, before shooting out, trailing a long chain that connected it to the ship. The anchor pierced the side of the dome, and held fast as the Yamato's braking thrusters activated, eventually stopping Yamato and slowing the dome's progress. For a moment Wildstar thought the chain may brake, but it held strong. He would make sure that the chain was checked for weakened links as soon as they had some down time.
Conroy, the leader of the Cosmo Tigers, franticly radioed the ship. "We can't stop it. The Worldship is about to warp."
"Worry about that later," Wildstar said. "All Cosmo Tigers are to check the dome and then return to the ship. Ready the Cosmo Hound and medical shuttles for launch. Row, Venture, Sandor follow me." Wildstar was worried that he may have injured some of the hostages, or compromised the structural integrity of the dome when he used the Rocket Anchor to stop it. Wildstar's feeling that the operation had failed increased as he watched the Worldship wink out of existence as it entered a space warp. He jumped from his seat and headed for the Cosmo Hound.
IQ-9 was the first to board one board the Cosmo Hound, followed shortly by Wildstar, Venture, Sandor, Row, Dr. Sane and a medical team. Wildstar ordered them to lift off as soon as he was seated in the front next to Venture. Row hastily climbed up into the top gun turret.
Part of the Yamato's side armor hinged downward becoming the Cosmo Hound's launching pad. The Cosmo Hound was a large landing craft that was too large to fit in the regular landing bay. It balanced heavy weaponry with speed and maneuverability; and it could be adjusted to fill almost any mission.
"The dome appears to be unarmed," Conroy's voice echoed from the communications console.
"Thanks Conroy, get back to the ship and refuel." Wildstar ordered.
"Roger."
The Cosmo Hound lifted off vertically and flew towards the Dome that was still secured with the Yamato's rocket anchor.
Sandor leaned over Row and Wildstar's shoulders trying to get a better look. "Take another pass, I want to get a better look at the damage," Sandor suggested, then went back and traded places with Row in the gun turret.
"Strange," Sandor said, more to himself than anyone else.
"What is it Sandor?" Wildstar asked.
"Send IQ-9 out to investigate. He should be able to get a better idea of what is inside with a smaller risk to whatever is inside."
"Go ahead, IQ." Wildstar said. He could tell from experience that Sandor knew something, but didn't want to say anything about it until he was absolutely sure. One way or another it was not going to be good news, he thought, which he didn't want to think about since he desperately wanted his wife and kids to be on the inside of the dome.
"Yes, Wildstar." IQ-9 replied, while moving into the airlock. More than anything else, the robot needed to see Nova again.
Once in the vacuum of space, IQ activated his jets and flew over to the impact point of the anchor. It had punctured all the way into the interior of the dome, but there was not enough of a gap for him to see inside around the anchor. Seeing little other option he used the cutting torch built into one of his fingers to cut a larger hole into the side of the dome so he could get a better look.
He held the freed circle of metal in place, to prevent too much of the air within the dome from escaping, but moved it away long enough to get a good view of what was inside. He was surprised at how easy he was able to do so.
"Wildstar."
"Yes, IQ-9?"
"There are no humans in this dome, but the beings that are there are already dead," IQ-9 reported with more than his usual monotone.
Wildstar slammed his hand down on the communications panel, and opened up a channel to the Yamato. "Yumi, have Eager calculate the Worldship's destination, and send all of our data to Homer on Earth, so he can double check our figures." Wildstar cut the channel and sat in the silence of his conflicting emotions.
Dr. Sane opened up his own channel to the other medical ships. "Secure the leaks in that dome right away! Be sure to save me a sample of whatever atmosphere is inside, and bring some of the bodies to the ship's sickbay!"
Row looked up at Sandor in his gunnery chair. "How did you know?"
"Because of the amount of air escaping around the rocket anchor, there wasn't enough pressure behind it for there to have been enough atmosphere inside the dome to support human life."
"How do you know it didn't all leak out in the time it took us to get here?"
"The leak is too small… besides I suspect that if there had been enough atmosphere inside that dome, then it would have ruptured when we punctured it," Sandor soberly answered. Sandor climbed down and looked over at Wildstar, whom he knew was filled with self-doubt. It would take Dr. Sane hours of explaining to convince Wildstar that the people had been dead long before they had punctured the dome.
Venture was filled with doubts of his own. Surely Wildstar could have done something differently. How many pilots had they lost, and all they had accomplished was to save a dome full of alien bodies. He opened his mouth to say so, when the look on his captain's face reminded him of exactly what was at stake for the captain personally. "Um, Captain? What do we do now?"
When Wildstar remained silent, Sandor answered. "Take us back to Yamato. We have a lot of work and planning to do."
Malathin's hologram appeared before Sodoman, barely keeping his anger in check.
"Why do you disturb me, Malathin?" Sodoman asked.
"High Lord Sodoman… the Yamato was able to see through our warp tricks and found us."
"You destroyed them, of course?"
"With what, High Lord? All I have at my disposal are a few cannons and fighters. They took us by surprise, and wiped out most of our offensive capability in seconds."
"So, you are telling me that you are unable to handle your position?" Sodoman asked, or rather threatened.
Malathin realized that this conversation could easily turn out more disastrous for him than the Yamato's attack if he wasn't careful. "I can handle my position, and the Worldship, High Lord, but the Worldship is not a warship, and it cannot defend itself from an attack by a warship."
Sodoman frowned.
"What the Worldship requires, High Lord, is an escort of ships to aid in its protection and defense. If we had made an active attempt to engage the Yamato, we would have certainly lost many of our habitats and the subjects they contain, and we cannot risk that. Not yet."
Finally Sodoman nodded. "Very well. I will get you escort ships. But if you are again attacked by a lone ship, and do not manage to obliterate it with your new combined resources, I will be forced to reevaluate your position."
Sodoman broke the connection.