Earth Defiant (The Ember War Saga Book 4) Read online

  “Thank you, Admiral,” Valdar said. Calling her by a rank she’d never earned made his stomach churn.

  “I know you by reputation,” she said. “You came up with the assault plan for the Battle of the Crucible, held the fleet together when the America and Admiral Garret went down. I have a tactical puzzle that I think you—and the Breitenfeld—can help me solve.”

  “Happy to help.” Valdar’s lips tugged at a sneer, which he masked with a scratch to his face.

  “Are you all right, Captain?” Makarov looked at him with genuine concern.

  She stood up and went to the urn. She took up the kettle by the handle and poured dark tea into the cups. She held a partially full cup beneath the spigot and twisted the handle, releasing steaming hot water into the cup. She prepared the second cup and placed one in front of Valdar, keeping the other for herself.

  The smell promised a bitter taste. Valdar wouldn’t have minded a few ice cubes and sugar to make the drink proper to his Virginia upbringing.

  “I lost my original samovar,” she said. “My family carried it out of Soviet Russia to Ukraine when the regime fell. My great-grandfather knew a little too much about the KGB—where they buried the bodies, kept all the money, that sort of thing. He decided to take a little culture, and some of the money, with him and the family. I had it in stored in Kiev, but the Xaros…This is a reconstruction from photos, not as good as the real thing.”

  No you didn’t, Valdar thought. Everything you are was a computer simulation. Fake.

  “Your ship’s jump engines, we could use them to our advantage in the coming fight.” She slid a data slate across the table. “What do you think?”

  Valdar skimmed over the operation’s order. His lips pressed together in concentration as he grasped the sheer audacity of what Makarov had planned.

  “The missiles…if the Toth have better point defense systems than us, this won’t work,” Valdar said.

  “Graviton seekers,” she said, “no electronics to hack or jam. We were going to use these to overwhelm the Xaros’ point defense, but with a little modification…”

  “You came up with this?”

  “The concept, my staff worked out the details. What? You think I found these stars in a cereal box?” Makarov gave Valdar a sly smile.

  Valdar bit his lip.

  CHAPTER 12

  Captain Bakshi strapped himself into the command chair of the Javelin. He swiped the Sikh turban off his head and shoved it into a compartment beneath his chair. God would forgive the affront. He still had his kirpan knife on his person and an iron bracelet on his wrist.

  Bakshi snapped his armored helmet on and attached it to air lines running from his headrest.

  “XO, set battle stations for the task force, cleared for zero atmosphere conditions.” A ship full of air risked fires and decompression damage during void combat. Fighting in largely self-contained and lightly armored suits increased the chances of surviving. Any injury that could pierce the suit would likely prove fatal, a risk every good void sailor understood.

  “Condensers on full,” his XO said, “we’ll be zero atmo in five minutes.”

  Bakshi had commanded the Rorke, a much larger vessel than the Javelin. Moving lower on the tonnage scale from command to command normally meant career suicide for a naval career, but when Admiral Garret had explained the need and the reasoning behind this assignment, he’d accepted it willingly.

  Sitting in a ship barely the size of a destroyer and anchored against an asteroid for months got old quick, but he and the crew adapted. They’d waited and trained for this moment; now the lancer concept would have its trial by fire.

  “Spotters show the Naga on approach,” his XO said. “It will enter range of the graviton mine in three minutes.”

  “Let’s hope that thing works as advertised,” Bakshi said, “or we’re not going to be able to do much more than wave as it goes by.”

  “Spear, Broadhead and Pike report battle ready,” the communications ensign reported.

  “Arm the mine. Set gravity-well trigger to one million kilo mass trigger,” Bakshi said. Alcubierre drives warped space-time around a ship to propel it forward; the “flatter” the space-time, the faster a ship could travel. A sufficiently deep gravity well would disrupt the drives and slow the Naga down to a crawl.

  “Mine is armed,” the XO said.

  Bakshi opened a tight beam IR channel to the other ships. “Task Force Odin, this is Bakshi. Engage attack pattern alpha once we clear the asteroid. Good hunting.”

  The Javelin lurched to starboard as the graviton mine activated. Bakshi slid against the right side of the command chair, then the ship jerked to a halt.

  “Tether engaged successfully,” XO said. “Rest of the squadron are green.”

  “Ready the release. Conn, keep us orientated on the target as we clear,” Bakshi said.

  The pull from the graviton mine lessened, and the Javelin groaned as the stress on its hull faded away.

  “Detach cable,” Bakshi said. The asteroid slid across the view screen as the Javelin cut loose and drifted away. “Guns, charge the vanes.” Electricity arced and sparked just below the view of the screen as the four rail-cannon launchers came to life.

  “Two minutes until we clear the rock,” the conn officer said.

  “Too long. We’re not going to give them a chance to get their drives back up. Conn, fire dorsal thrusters. Give us a push,” Bakshi said.

  “Aye-aye, burning.”

  The ship shuddered and the asteroid sped across the view screen. The Naga hung in the void, canted away from the Javelin. The Naga’s engines flared to life with a blossom of white light.

  “Christ, that thing’s big,” the conn officer said.

  “All ships! Target center mass, clear all vanes on my mark…”

  “Firing solution locked. All vanes ready,” the gunnery officer said.

  “Fire!”

  The rail cannon mounted on the Javelin’s ventral hull sent a shell hurtling through the twinned vanes’ magnetic vortex, accelerating it to a velocity nearly six miles a second. The cannons mounted on the port, starboard and dorsal hull fired in succession seconds after the first round.

  The lancer ships were single-purpose vessels designed to pack the punch of a much larger ship, at the expense of almost everything else that mattered to a void ship—range, crew comfort, speed and survivability. The concept behind their design held promise in a fleet action against a larger Xaros construct…in theory. The same theory held when using lancers as an assassin’s mace against a single ship.

  Sixteen rail-cannon shells cut through space, all converging against the center of the Naga.

  “Ten seconds to impact,” gunnery said.

  “Reload and recharge. Squadron, get some space between us and fire at will. Wide spread,” Bakshi said.

  Bakshi leaned forward, his eyes locked on the view screen. A ripple of light spread across the Naga, wrapping into a cocoon around the ship. More waves of light spread over the ship, like a faucet dripping onto a pool of water. The cocoon around the Naga faded away.

  “No effect,” the gunnery officer said.

  “It’s shielded,” the XO said, her voice trembling with fear.

  “Keep firing!” Bakshi ordered. “Commo, send an update back to Titan right this second. Keep our feed open no matter what happens.” The ensign gave him a thumbs-up and frantically tapped at his keyboard.

  “Incoming!” XO shouted.

  “Conn, get space between us and—”

  A searing bolt of energy streaked out of the Naga, retracing the squadron’s rail-cannon shells. The white light overwhelmed the screen and Bakshi brought his hands over his face.

  The light faded away. Chunks of debris floated through space around the Javelin.

  “Spear is gone!” the XO said.

  “Guns, why aren’t we firing?” Bakshi asked.

  “Vanes almost ready, sir.” Three new bolts emerged from the Naga. “Firing!”
>
  Bakshi watched as four more shells leaped toward the Naga. “Titan, this is Captain Bakshi with Task Force Odin. The Naga is shielded. I repeat, the Naga is shielded.” An incoming bolt flared as it annihilated the first round from the Javelin. “Rail cannons are ineffective.” The bolt diminished as the next two rounds passed through it and burst into fragments. “I’m sending back every bit of telemetry data we’ve got. Spear lost with all hands.”

  The bolt burnt through the last rail-cannon shell and smashed into the Javelin. Shattered vanes spun into space as the forward half of the ship crumpled under the impact. The bridge and engineering compartments went tumbling through the void, like they’d been swatted aside by a giant hand.

  Bakshi tossed against his restraints. The XO’s chair broke loose from its moorings and slammed her against the bulkhead with a sickening crunch. Bakshi’s world went black seconds later.

  ****

  Stacey, Ibarra and Rochambeau watched a grainy video feed. Broken work pods and smeared blood filled the Javelin’s wrecked bridge. A gloved hand dangled in front of the camera.

  “Ugh…report,” Bakshi said. The hand lifted off screen. “Anyone?”

  The blast door to the bridge bent inward with a screech of metal.

  A Toth ululation screamed from the speakers.

  The door fell off its hinges with the next blow. Toth menials filled the door, hissing at Bakshi. A gauss pistol snapped, killing the nearest menial with a screech of pain as more menials rushed into the room.

  Bakshi screamed. A gauss pistol fell in front of the camera, still gripped by a bloody hand dismembered at the wrist.

  The menials dragged Bakshi off the bridge, and his screams faded away.

  Stacey turned off the recording.

  “There’s nothing after that,” she said.

  “What did he know?” Rochambeau asked, running the claw tips on his fingers through his goatee. “They took him to the overlord.”

  Admiral Garret’s hologram appeared. “The rest of Task Force Odin’s positions in the asteroid belt, graviton mines emplacements. The legacy fleet strength, but not the current number of hulls and crews.”

  “Nothing about Eighth Fleet or the shipyards within Ceres?” Ibarra asked.

  “No, we kept him and the rest of Odin in the dark…for precisely this reason,” Garret said.

  “Their shields.” Rochambeau rewound the footage. “There are several species in the Alliance with similar energy-screen technology. The Vishrakath, Caar Imperium, Tikari Collective, relicts of the wars before the Xaros threat.”

  “Why didn’t the probe give this to us?” Garret asked. “We could’ve incorporated this into our new ships.”

  Rochambeau clicked his tongue. “The Tikari thought energy shields would protect them from the Xaros disintegration beams, but the drones cracked the resonant frequencies and stripped the shields away. The probe didn’t give you the tech because it would have been useless against the drones.”

  “How’d it work out for the Tikari?” Garret asked.

  “They’re extinct.”

  “So, how do we figure out the resonance freqs on the Naga?” Stacey asked.

  “The probe could do it.” Ibarra pointed to the empty plinth in the center of the command center. “But it’s still compromised.”

  “At their current speeds, the Naga will be here in twenty-eight hours,” Stacey said. “The rest of the Toth fleet twelve hours later. I don’t understand why the big ugly isn’t waiting for the rest, mass their forces as one.”

  “There’s more than one elite,” Rochambeau said. “One on the Naga. At least one more with the rest of the fleet. Whichever claims Earth gains a greater share of the profits.”

  “Thank God for small favors,” Stacey said.

  Garret tapped his knuckles against a table. “Focus, people. If we can’t get past the Toth shields, then this is all over but the screaming. I need options from you big-brain types before I send my fleets face-first into an oncoming train.”

  “You’re wrong to look at this like a military problem, Admiral,” Ibarra said. “The Toth aren’t here to beat us down and plant a flag. They’re here for profit. And, as a veteran businessman, let me tell you that controlling costs is essential for a wider profit margin. That’s why they were willing to talk with us on Europa.”

  “Nothing about what you just said solved the problem of the Naga’s shields,” Garret said.

  “Those shields are running off a dark-energy battery, just like the one the Breitenfeld has for its jump drive,” Ibarra said. “We disable that battery and the ship is vulnerable.”

  “Oh, that’s all there is to it? Well, why didn’t you just say you’ve got a magic wand hidden somewhere on the Crucible,” Garret said with a chiding voice. “Push the damn ‘We Win’ button already or do you have something more practical in mind?”

  “Subtlety and misdirection, Admiral,” Ibarra said. “Hear me out.”

  ****

  “You’ll do it?” Ibarra asked Rochambeau.

  “Why me?” The Karigole crossed his arms across his chest.

  “The list of humans I’d trust with something this vital is pretty damn short. I don’t have to worry about any true-born or proccie sympathies with you,” Ibarra said.

  “The doughboys won’t accept me, ghost,” Rochambeau said.

  “Only if they think you’re not human,” Ibarra said. “We cover that ugly mug of yours and you could pass. We just have to imprint enough of them with your vocal signature and they won’t know the difference. Just so you know…this is almost certainly a one-way trip.”

  “If this is my final battle, then it will be worth it,” Rochambeau said. “I agree to your task.” He bowed slightly and left the command center.

  “And you?” he asked Stacey.

  Stacey looked at the chair with the halo and rubbed her hands together.

  “It’s not as simple as you make is sound. If the timing is off by a few seconds, then it will be a disaster,” she said.

  “Then get the timing right. You’re a smart girl. I’ve seen you do harder math.”

  “There’s more, Grandpa. The Qa’Resh sent me back with a gift, and if I foul this up, we may never get the chance to use it.” Stacey went to a console and tapped on the control panel. A blue-green world with oceans and wide continents appeared in the holo projector.

  “This is…the Qa’Resh just have a location, not a name. Let’s call it Terra Nova. Earth-like down to the gravity and atmosphere content. Geologically stable, local space is clear of threatening comets and asteroids for a million years. Life on the planet similar to our Miocene epoch—large mammals, oceans full of life and no intelligent natives. Couldn’t ask for a better place for humans to colonize,” she said.

  “Pretty, but irrelevant when the Xaros overrun the galaxy,” Ibarra said.

  “That’s just the thing. Terra Nova isn’t inside the Milky Way. It’s in Canis Major, a star cluster beyond the fringe of the Milky Way. The Qa’Resh think the Xaros will stop at the edge of the galaxy. If they do keep going, it’ll take the drones almost ten thousand years to reach Terra Nova. The Qa’Resh gave me the gate settings to reach Terra Nova. We pack the Canticle of Reason and some of our civilian ships full of colonists, the omnium reactor and a couple fabrication units and we’ve got a chance to save our species.”

  “What about the Dotok?”

  “You care? I’m surprised. There’s room for them.”

  “Why are the Qa’Resh doing this? Don’t tell me they found out about Terra Nova last week. Every species in the Alliance would kill for a chance to escape the Xaros,” Ibarra said.

  “The one I talked to, she said the Qa’Resh feel guilty for what they’ve put us through. What’ll happen if the Toth win this fight? Terra Nova is their chance at a cleaner conscience, but if I’m using the Crucible for this crazy plan of yours, I may not have the chance to get a colony ship through in the middle of a battle.”

  “A world safe from the
Xaros.” Ibarra raised his fingertips to the holographic globe. “But you won’t be able to go. You have to keep the gate open.”

  “I’ll stay behind, help reboot Earth with new proccies that fit more in line with what the Alliance wants from us,” Stacey said, turning her face away from Ibarra.

  “You agreed to that?”

  “Don’t get all high and mighty with me. You’ve cut worse deals with them. That was the agreement: Terra Nova in exchange for my help if the Toth take the planet,” she said.

  “None of these options are easy,” Ibarra said. “Save part of the population and probably doom the rest to being slaves to the Toth, or fight to win with the risk of losing everything.”

  “Hedge our bets?”

  “I’ll get a small civilian ship loaded quietly, stop a run on the space port. If the plan falls on its face, we’ll get something through to Terra Nova.” Ibarra turned to a screen and scrolled through a ship registry.

  “What about the Dotok?”

  “Well, we can’t always get what we want. You want to save them? You’d better start thinking with portals.”

  ****

  Standish slapped a fresh battery into his gauss rifle and attached it to the magnetic locks on his back. His squad mates snapped their armor on, glancing at a ticking clock above their lockers.

  “I win again,” Standish said. He brushed imaginary dust from his gauntlets.

  “You don’t win a damn thing until you pass Gunney’s inspection,” Orozco said.

  “It’s fifty push-ups—in armor and with your pseudo disabled—for a gig. I learned my lesson after the third time he got me,” Standish said.

  A chest piece clattered to the ground and spun across the deck. Yarrow cursed and chased after it.

  Orozco gave Standish a stern look then nodded his head toward Yarrow.

  Standish scooped up the armor piece and smiled at Yarrow, who had sweat beading against his brow and flushed cheeks.

  “Settle down, new guy,” Standish said. He pressed the armor against the medic’s chest and activated the fasteners. “You nervous all the sudden? What for?”