Birthright: Battle for the Confederation- Turmoil (13 page)

Suddenly a red flash
lit up the cockpit, turning everything an angry crimson shade for a split
second and throwing dark shadows across their faces. 

"They just
fired on us!" yelled Elon, surprise giving way to alarm at the thought
that the enemy could reach out and hit them at this range.  He turned to
Merrin.  "What else have you got?"

She couldn't spare
much processing power for a conversation at the moment; she was dividing her
attention between flying the transport, watching the nav displays, and keeping
an eye on the threat warning receiver.  It alerted her a second or two before
an inbound shot was about to hit them, and gave her a split second to make some
sort of vector change to avoid the incoming blast.  She dodged and rolled
furiously, hoping that the gravity generator and inertial compensators were up
to the task of keeping all of the ship's passengers stuck in one place so as
not to coat the cargo bay in a thin layer of everyone's suppers.    

Finally, they were
rebounding back into space, heading out-system.  Merrin was starting to breathe
easier; after the first half dozen laser blasts, she hadn't noticed one in a
while.  It was impossible for her to keep track of time as she lived in the moment,
second to second, but it felt like it had been long enough to allow a glimmer
of hope to rise to the surface.  She glanced at the nav screen and saw the
Priman ships falling behind, and was about to say something to that effect when
she saw the telltale fireball of a large, oxygen-fed explosion out of the
corner of her eye in the viewport.  She spared a second to snap her head over
to look at the scene, then back at the nav display.  One of the transport icons
winked out of existence.  Five thousand people had just been annihilated.

"Do you think
we're far enough away-" Elon began, but didn't finish his sentence.

A hailstorm of
laserfire chopped away at the cockpit, shredding it in seconds as a flight of
Priman fighters dashed by.  They pulled up and over the top of the transport's
plane of flight, then rolled themselves one hundred eighty degrees in a
practiced maneuver.  Extra-atmospheric flight didn't require aerobatic
maneuvers, but most species still flew that way to keep their speeds consistently
high instead of stopping, turning, and accelerating again, and the Primans were
no exception.  Speed is life, so the saying goes, whether fighting in
atmosphere or not.

They came swooping
in for another pass, all ten of them, and pounded the transport's engines into
submission.  Then, relentless in their determination to destroy the ship, them
came in yet again.  This time, they just fired on everything they could hit on
their pass and then broke off to take up formation high and behind the doomed
ship.  The Lead Sled had already started to nose over before the death blow was
dealt, and it kept heading in that direction.  In no time, gravity began its
grim task, clawing at the foundering ship as the pull of Lemuria's mass began
to draw it downward with the inevitability of an elemental universal force. 
Friction began to heat the leading edges of the transport.  The metals used in
its construction were incredibly tough; shields weren't needed for re-entry,
though it helped reduce wear and tear on vital components.  But this was no
normal re-entry.  The ship began to turn, slowly at first, then faster as it
took on a spin.  Eventually, parts of the airframe glowed white hot and began
to soften, buckling and separating from the structure until there was just the
torn up, disintegrating shell of a formerly spaceworthy vessel.  In seconds, it
was just a bright comet, streaking across the night sky briefly before
everything burned away.

"An effective
demonstration, Captain Vol," Representative Ravine commented neutrally. 
"I don't see you having any more trouble from them."

And indeed the
captain didn't.  As soon as the gruesome show was over, the remaining
transports had come to dead stops wherever they were.  They were herded into
one large formation and were instructed to wait there under the guard of a
handful of Priman fighters.

"This planet is
ours," Vol said for the bridge crew to hear, "as are those people and
those ships.  They do not get to leave, they do not get to warn the
Confederation or take their possessions, which we may have use for.  This will
serve as a demonstration for the next place we visit."

Representative
Ravine smiled at the captain and walked across the bridge to inspect the
results of the capitol bombardment.  Any minute now somebody else from the
planet would claim authority and call to negotiate; that's the way it always
worked.   She was careful to be facing away from the captain before she let her
face relax, and she breathed out heavily, then held her lungs empty before
finally breathing again.  She realized these people had needed a demonstration,
that the locals were indeed under the impression they had a lot more leeway
than they really did, but part of her wondered if Captain Vol had gone too
far.  Yes, he was following orders, and frankly he was even following the
spirit of the orders, as issued by the Commander.  The time for pleasantries
was well past; these people knew who they were dealing with by now, and had no
excuses.  Still, she wondered if this was what Representative Velk felt near
the end of his time as Commander, if he had to decide between an open hand or
an iron fist.  Did ten thousand people need to die just now to make a point? 
Which method would these people respond to, and how would she know which path
was right when it was her time to lead?

General Horle
couldn't stop coughing.  He didn't know if it was the dust and debris that
choked the air in the underground chamber or the shrapnel he'd taken in his
side, but the result was that he couldn't make the hacking cough cease. 
Luckily, the bunker's lights weren't functioning, so he couldn't check his
right side where the pain was located every time he was racked by another fit. 
He probably wouldn't like what he saw.

The bunker had been
spared the worst of the Priman attack, but since it was a military installation
in the capital city it had been targeted.  The above-ground facilities were
gone- wiped off the face of the planet.  The underground levels had only fared
marginally better; most were without power and had taken damage.  Horle's own
command center had suffered a partially collapsed ceiling and power loss, but
emergency lights were gradually kicking in and personnel were handing out
flashlights at present.  Data wasn't coming in anymore, though, and that was a
problem for the man who was supposed to help defend the planet.

"So you think
the capitol is gone, don't you," Horle grumbled to Elco, who sat beside
him holding a portable cell stimulator to the growing lump on his own head.

"Based on their
past practices," Elco grudgingly admitted, "that would be my guess. 
I'm sorry, General."

Horle waved off the
condolences.  "We'll grieve later.  Right now, I just wish I knew whether
the Primans are negotiating a cease-fire or if they're still attacking my planet."

"There is one
small shred of good news," Elco suggested.  "It's not much, but it's
all we've got."  He looked in Horle's eyes and showed a malicious grin,
the sort of ace that would make friends and enemy alike nervous.  "Those
bastards only think I have two ships with me."

"Two
ships," Loren muttered under his breath as he listened to the exchange on
the open comm frequency that General Horle had beamed out into space.  It
wasn't a  directional signal, an intentional practice so the Primans couldn't
just trace it from source to destination.  He heard the end as well, and saw on
long range sensors the fire poured down onto the surface by the Primans.  He
resisted the urge to command Avenger into action; first off, it wasn't his call
since he wasn't in command.  Second, the Lemurians needed to ask for help,
though with the capitol itself in ruins he didn't know how anyone would assume
command.

"Commander
Stone," Loren heard, and shook himself out of his reverie in order to
answer the face on the surface of the desktop in front of him.  The Captain's station
featured the most comfortable chair as well as a workspace whose surface could
serve just about any function imaginable.   Right now, a small window was open
to Captain Montari on the battleship Majestic and Captain Rese on Cobalt.

"Yes,
Captain?" Loren replied hopefully.  The best thing he could hear right now
would be an order to execute their attack plan.

"Your friend,
Captain Renner, is in charge of those destroyers, correct?" Captain
Montari was just checking his facts, but Loren assumed there was a greater
purpose to the call.

"Yes, he
is," Loren confirmed.

"I hate sitting
like this just as much as you do," Montari continued, the gray-skinned
Trin unconsciously sniffing the air.  With a sense of smell several times more
acute than Humans, the man was falling back on old hard-wired instincts as he
sought out sweat, pheromones, and other signs of trouble on a wind that didn't
exist in space.  On the surface of a planet, he'd be able to tell if Renner was
in trouble from quite a distance.  In space, he was was stuck with the same
technology everyone else was.

"All we can do
is be ready," Montari continued.  "Your new torpedoes are warmed up
and ready to run in?" he asked.

"With much
anticipation," Loren replied.  They were talking about the latest torpedo
upgrade; an external bolt-on miniature hyperdrive.  It was short ranged,
couldn't maneuver or see anything while in hyper, and the engine burned out
after the run, endowing them with the nickname of 'The Lightweight', because
they were one-and-done on their hyper engine, just like the alcohol tolerance
of the average Navy new recruit.  The bulky engine modules made them unable to
be fired from a torpedo tube, so they'd had to drag them into place with
Freedom class transports and leave them in position with a Prowler riding herd
to send them their 'go' command if need be.

Loren had deployed
six of them far from Avenger's current position.  If need be, he'd send a
command to the Prowler, which would upload the target coordinates and send them
on their way.  A brief hyperspace run later and they'd revert at their
coordinates and begin looking for a Priman target.  It would be a great
distraction since Avenger was not at the beginning of their trajectory.  If the
Primans tried to find the launching vessel, they'd be out of luck.

Representative
Ravine paced the bridge.  It had been ten minutes and nobody had tried to
contact them since they'd razed the capitol district.  Captain Vol had tried to
urge them on by targeting the next largest city on the continent and firing a
saturation bombardment that was intended to cause widespread destruction and
panic.  She once almost tried to address him about his choice of strategies but
quickly reconsidered.  She wasn't in charge, and might never be if she appeared
too squeamish about what needed to be done.

"If they take
another five minutes without contacting us," Vol proclaimed, "we'll
move on to the next city.  Sooner or later somebody will volunteer to speak for
these people."

Captain Renner sat
utterly still in the command chair aboard his destroyer.  He'd watched
helplessly as the Primans had blasted the capitol city, killing thousands of
his people.  He'd seen the data feeds drop offline from the Governor's Mansion
and several key military facilities as they'd been destroyed or taken out of
the loop.  Now, he waited in vain for some signal from the surface.  He knew
the crew on the small bridge was casting sideways glances at him, hoping to see
what he planned to do.  The surreptitious glances didn't soothe his frayed
nerves, either.  His express orders were to maintain a submissive posture while
the leaders attempted to bargain with the Primans.  Well, apparently the
bargaining wasn't going very well.  The problem was that nobody was filling the
gap with the capitol district destroyed.  Perhaps everyone else was too afraid
of being identified to take on the mantle of representing his planet.  

He saw on the
displays as the Primans shifted their orbits slightly and aligned themselves
towards a new target on the surface.  He couldn't take it any more. 
"Communications," he said softly, then got up and took the handful of
steps over to the console and the young woman who was stationed there.  She
adjusted her headset and waited for her captain to continue.  "Send a
message to the Confeds on the encoded channel they're listening on.  Tell them
that if the Primans attack another defenseless city I intend to engage and
formally request their assistance.  Awaiting a reply."

She nodded and
quickly encoded and sent the message, a look of relief on her face that was
evident to Renner.  They didn't stand a chance by themselves, and frankly it
didn't look all that much better with the Confeds at their sides.  Still, she
thought it was better to die fighting these invaders for their planet than
sitting by impotently and watching them destroy their home.

"Commander!"
called the comms officer, and Loren almost jumped out of his chair.  He'd been
in the same sullen reverie that Renner had been in, but Loren was even worse
off because he had zero options until a request for help was made.

"What is it,
Comms?" Loren asked in as controlled a manner as he could manage.

"Request for
assistance on the coded frequency," the officer began.  "Captain
Renner says he intends to engage if the Primans fire on another city without
provocation and they're asking us to confirm readiness to assist."

"Hell yes,
we're ready," Loren replied resolutely.  "Tell Captain Montari we're
all set, and contact Captain Sosus and tell her to get ready for some
excitement."  He paused as he tried to run through all the important items
in his head.  "Did the rest of Cory's squadron make it out into
position?"