Blind into the Breach (The Hunter Imperium Book 4), page 19
My eyes opened, and I shot a glance at Jane. She was of course still grinning.
"When you pass out, I'll know where your limit is."
"Gee, thanks."
"You ready to take control?"
"Fine. Give it to me."
She did. Like the simulator had shown, flying the bigger ship was no different from flying the Excalibur.
"Are they far enough away Jane?"
"Should be. Spin her around, and let's find out."
"And you didn’t try it yourself, why?"
She laughed, and tapped her nose.
"Dreamwalker to 266, I'm going to strafe, and check our distances are okay."
"Must we?" asked Watershed.
"Better now than in combat," said Vulture. "Approved, but do it slowly."
"Aye sir."
I pressed the strafe button, and changed the heading towards the flight above. Jane popped up a tactical, showing us continuing forward, but now the ship was on an angle. The distance seemed fine, with a gap giving plenty of room for actually changing course, and I continued around to each flight in turn.
I made very sure I didn’t press the strafe button again.
Before returning the ship to face its course, I spun it rapidly around the whole sphere. For a moment I almost threw up due to the rapid shift in my view forward, but it helped I’d not had breakfast yet.
On the other hand though, the mage was doubled up, and making a very real mess. I nodded to Jane, and she put the ship back on course, nodded back to me, and I hit the strafe button again. The mage looked at me.
"A little warning before you do that next time please."
She looked at the mess, and it vanished.
"Noted. That was a bit extreme for me too. But it might be something I need to do in combat."
"Noted. Just let me get my eyes closed first."
"I will. Promise."
"Unless he forgets," added Jane.
Silence followed as for the next hour, Vulture kept changing our orientation around Orion. Jane did most of the flying, and I concentrated on what I could see. It was more than just vision. I was getting the distances and angles between ships, and could see Rockmonster continually tweaking her course to stay on Falcon's wing, who was now wingman for Vulture.
"Use your AI for station keeping," I pinged her.
"Mind your own business," she pinged back snappily.
I took the hint to not stick my nose in where it wasn’t wanted. But continued to develop the skill of taking all this information in without it overloading me.
"Jane?"
"Chris?"
"If I ever fly a bigger ship than this, we either need to restrict the inputs to what I have now, or I'll need some serious alone time with the ship in space while we add things one by one until I do overload. Just right now, I’d hate to be flying Fearless."
"But you're fine with what you have now?"
"Only just. It's getting easier the longer we fly."
"Good."
More time went by, but I started monitoring where Orion was, and what the other dots in the system were doing. One by one, a half dozen Lightnings overtook us, and landed on the flight deck from the rear. I wondered how much longer we'd be out here, given how close we were getting to a jump point. Finally I found out.
"CO to 266. RTB. We're at the frontier now, and before we jump though, we're going to take a peek. You get ten for a break, and be ready to launch again. Out."
"You heard the boss," said Vulture. "Let's drop behind Orion slightly, and land these birds. Dreamwalker, you dock independently."
Which made sense.
I just had to make sure I didn’t hit anyone doing it.
Forty Four
"Dreamwalker to the bridge."
"We better get moving," said Jane, jumping up from her chair.
We'd had our ten, I'd found a fully stocked kitchen and downed a bottle of water and a few snacks, and been back in my chair on time. The mage was a minute or two behind me, but it hadn't mattered.
A full half hour had gone by before the command had come through. I knew Orion had stopped a good distance from the jump point, but nothing more.
We ran for the airlock, through the boarding tube, and towards the nearest travel car.
"Why were we running?" I asked Jane while in the car, since we had time to talk as the car went the full length of the ship.
"You'll find out."
And I did.
I found the CO in the Admiral's chair, the captain's chair empty, and Eagle, Buzzard, and Chaos clustered around the CO. They all looked at me as we walked in.
The CO looked pissed. Everyone else looked serious. I wondered what the hell I’d done.
"Check the popup," Eagle said, as I stopped a pace away from them.
Jane went right past us, and took her normal place on a bridge, which was to the left of where Orion was.
The screen overlaid over everything appeared to be a tactical map.
"Next system?" I asked.
"After our collision," said the CO, "the Imperator emphasized not doing that again. And since the next system is where we expect to find a plant presence, the head mage moved a cloaked comnavsat in. That’s what it's telling us."
I looked at it again, and gulped. And for the life of me, I couldn’t understand why they were showing me. This was so far above my pay grade, I had trouble keeping my jaw from dropping open.
The obvious thing was a station some distance from the jump point, but well within our scanner range. That was the good news for the marines. They'd be getting to play with their swords again soon.
But the bad news was ten fleets with a standard mix of two battleships, four cruisers, and six destroyers. Twenty by a hundred was two thousand fighters. We could take those. But.
The worse news was another three fleets comprised of only battleships. Thirty six by a hundred was three thousand six hundred, and thus five thousand six hundred fighters in total. And fifty six battleships. The hundred support ships were significant on their own, but in this context, not the main threats.
For now, they were drawn up a little way away from the jump point, with enough room for fighters to attack anything coming through without risking the bigger ships.
"Killing ground?" I asked.
"That’s what we think," said Eagle. "That’s one hell of a lot of cruiser pulses the first thing through will get. Not to mention all the battleship pulses at the same time."
"Do we know anything about plant intelligence?"
"Why do you ask?" asked the CO.
"If I didn’t know better, I’d say that was a trap for us."
There was silence for a good minute.
"Yep," said Chaos finally. "I tend to agree. They've been paying attention to our formations and tactics, and obviously knew we were heading here."
"We've had no indication of anything like that so far," said Hallington.
"Could be they've simply been testing us," said Buzzard. "Anyone else seen a trap yet?"
"No, not that I've heard of anyway."
"Boss, maybe you should report this in, and ask for orders."
He looked at Eagle, closed his eyes for a moment, opened them looking older, and nodded to Orion. A channel opened. A bridge appeared on a popup screen, with the Imperator, Jane, and a white skinned mage visible. There was a cat sitting on the main console, facing the cam.
"A little busy here admiral," said the Imperator.
His left hand pulled the speed slider back violently, his right hand yanked the stick back hard, and he reversed them rapidly. He'd just flipped his ship to go back the way it came, and by the size of the empty bridge around him, he was flying something a lot bigger than I was used to. His finger jerked the trigger, I could see his fingers working torpedo and missile firing at the same time, and his face showed he was totally in the zone.
Another pop-up appeared, showing what was happening in front of the ship. The firepower he had caught my breathe, but how much was coming back at him was breathtaking. Jane popped up another screen, showing BigMother's shields to be falling below twenty percent.
"Sorry sir," said Hallington. "We've reached the frontier, and the plants appear to have staked out a trap for us. I need orders."
There was nothing from the other side, as the Imperator continued to fight his ship.
"Yeah, here too. FUCK!"
He closed his eyes for a moment. Off to one side I could see a Scimitar class taking a lot of fire, and as we watched, it vanished through an oblong hole in space.
"Shit George. We've got all day for fuck's sake. Don't be so suicidal. Recharge before you come in again."
"Sorry boss."
"Meow!"
The view ahead showed another oblong box appear, and the ship went straight into it, the view changing to empty space.
"Did that cat just give him an order?" I asked quietly.
"Yes," said Chaos, grinning.
The Imperator sighed, and his eyes focused on us.
"Okay, got a moment now. Ah, I see the problem. They did something totally different for us, and I agree, that trap is for you. Kinda indicates they're more intelligent than we gave them credit for."
"Or they have some sort of hive mind," said the Jane on BigMother.
"Whatever it is, it needs research before they really put our arses into a meat grinder."
"Fair's fair, we’ve been doing it to them."
"And they obviously learned more than we thought they did."
He sat and thought for a few moments.
"Admiral, you can certainly hold the jump point on your side until the Ralnor arrive, but the longer those ships are there, the more fleets they're going to accumulate. When they decide to come through, it will be with more than you can cope with."
"So we attack now?" asked Hallington.
"I would, but you’re the admiral on the spot."
"Any suggestions?"
He looked at Eagle, and back to Hallington.
"Put your best pilot in the seat, keep your fighters on board until it's safe to launch, and throw everything you've got at them."
"You mean fight Orion like she's a fighter?"
"Yes. They were designed for it. She's a solid ship of the line, and you've been using her as such, but now it's time to show them capabilities they haven't seen yet. Hang on."
Another popup had appeared in front of him, duplicated for us. It was my Aunt Susan.
"Motherfuckers!" she yelled, causing my jaw to drop open.
I had no idea she swore like that.
"You hit a trap too?" asked the Imperator.
"Damned right I did. Has anyone else?"
"Probably everyone has," I muttered.
Heads jerked around to look at me, including the Imperators.
"Could be right," said the Imperator. "You okay Admiral Bentley?"
"Yes. But the Ralnor were put through a blender. The mess here is huge, but the plants won't be getting through here any time soon. I can see another couple of fleets in the distance, but I'll have shields back by then, I'll be on the other side of the jump point, and all this debris is going to be the first thing they hit if they come through."
"Good. What's your status?"
"Operational, but Hammer is going to need a shipyard."
A popup supplied Hammer of Thor as her ship's name. I’d forgotten it.
Hallington's face suddenly went white. I caught up with the conversation by realizing a ship with twice the firepower we had, needed a shipyard to repair hull damage. Orion did as well, but through collisions, not weapons fire.
"Anything you need?"
"Apart from clean shorts?" She laughed. "A decent pilot would have helped. This wasn’t about slugging it out from a distance. And I never flew fighters myself. We need to rethink who sits the chair when we get the time for it."
"Noted. I'll be back to you when I know what else has been happening."
"Have you heard from Orion's Belt?"
"They found their trap before springing it, and have been listening in."
"Glad to hear it. Tell Chris I'm fine."
"He just heard."
"Great. Hammer out."
The channel closed, and the Imperator turned back to us. But didn’t say anything. The tactical there was showing his ships forming back up into a formation. But his shields were still low.
"So you want us to do something unexpected?" asked Eagle. "By putting a fighter pilot in the main chair?"
"Go to it, good luck."
The channel closed.
I suddenly found all eyes looking at me.
Forty Five
"You can't be serious!"
"Sir," muttered Buzzard.
"You want me to fly this ship into combat?"
"Can you think of a better pilot?" asked Hallington.
I looked at Eagle.
"Hell no. I'm good, but I'm not in your league."
My eyes closed, I shifted my mask to glasses, pulled them off, and shook my head. No-one said anything. I sighed, put my glasses back on, shifted to a mask, and opened my eyes again.
"You want to put the blind man in the chair of a titan class ship?"
"Bloody oath we do," said Chaos. "Your vision is probably the single best asset we have."
"Seriously?"
"Seriously," said Jane and Orion together.
"Here sir," said Kat, and a bottle of water slipped into my left hand.
I drank half of it immediately. Which was a mistake. I felt my gorge rising, and a feeling of sheer panic coming over me.
"When?" I asked, looking from Eagle to the CO.
"You can have five," said Hallington, "but not a moment longer."
I rushed out, looking for the nearest facilities. After throwing up what little was in my stomach, and dry heaving for a couple of minutes, I washed my mouth out, dried my face off, and stood there looking in the mirror. I waited for the panic to subside, relieved myself, and started walking back to the bridge.
I found many of the empty seats occupied. The general was there, as well as all of team one. And all of the squadron CO's. And quite a few I assumed were mages. I turned around, and walked back out again.
Grace caught up with me before I arrived back at the facilities.
"Hey. What's wrong?"
"Seriously? What's wrong? It's day seven since I got my sight back. I've been promoted twice, shuffled through four ships without mastering any of them, had it amply demonstrated I'm borderline not fit enough to even be a pilot, let alone a marine, and they want me to fight a ship the size of a station as if it was a fighter, while the biggest thing I've actually fought in is the size of a toothpick in comparison."
"And?"
"What could possibly go wrong?"
"We'll know shortly."
"How can you be that calm about this?"
"Because we're team one, and we always go in the shit end."
I stared at her.
"We never know what's going to happen. We put the person with the right skills in charge, and we go in. That’s what's happening right now."
I continued staring at her.
"So get your butt in that chair, and let's get this done."
I sighed. She held out a hand, I took it, and she led me back to the bridge, letting go before anyone could see it.
I walked as calmly as I could to the captain's chair, and sat with as much dignity as I could muster. Grace took her seat, and buckled up. I did the same, and turned towards the two AI's. But it was the Admiral who spoke first.
"Dreamwalker, you have the con."
"Dreamwalker has the con, aye sir," I parroted back, without shifting my gaze from Orion and Jane.
"Orion, please take us back as far as we need to be able to hit the jump point at full speed."
"As you wish."
Orion began to turn.
"Jane?"
"Your HUD preferences have been entered."
"You remember our talk this morning?"
"You'd prefer I didn’t kill you?"
There was a mutter behind me.
"I don’t really see the point, do you?"
"Not really. But I'll have to give you more just to ensure no blind spots."
"Let's ramp it up slowly, but give me a minute first."
"Confirmed."
I started cycling through weapons. The front circles of battleship guns were linked up to fire all at once. I unlinked them, and set them to fire one at a time from each of the three circles, with a tenth of a second between each gun. The result I hoped would be like three gatling guns firing together.
Next I linked up all the torpedo launchers, so they would fire one each, each time I pressed the fire button. This would deliver five hundred torpedoes for each button press, spaced well out to blanket an area of space in front of Orion.
The titan turrets were linked up next, but I set them to point defense mode, so they would fire at anything they could. I made sure I could set them back to normal fire mode, and also be able to quickly link them to the front guns if I wanted to.
"Jane?"
"Boss?"
"Can you control the capital ship missile launchers please?"
"Confirmed. Orders?"
"I'm going to be engaged with the fighters to start with, but I want you to target every ship with as many missiles as you can, and keep firing at them until I say otherwise, or they're no longer there."
One hundred and fifty eight targets, six thousand missiles per salvo. The math wasn’t particularly good, but it should keep the battleships occupied until I was ready for them. I looked at the specification for the mosquito launchers, and found they launched one hundred at a time, and were allocated three to a missile. Where Crusader had four and were seriously large on the side of the hull, Orion had a thousand, less a few damaged, and they were like pimples on the hull.
"Orion?"
"Boss?"
"Change the designation of the tree fighters from fighter to missile. And change the mosquito targeting parameters from three per missile to all hundred out of each launcher."
"As you wish."
"Wont that waste a lot of mosquitoes on actual missiles?" asked Eagle, who was sitting down the side near Jane.
"Yes, but the launcher AI's can retarget anything which misses. And the missile spam may distract the pilots when they figure out a hundred tiny missiles still make a dent in their shields, and are very difficult to avoid."
