Homeworld (Odyssey One) (27 page)

The mutual annihilation exploded out of the gravity well with the force of a nova, and six Drasin ships dropped out of warp.

Five survived the experience.

“What the hell was that?”

Eric ignored the voice, mostly because he had no idea what it was either. A flash of light ahead of them had blinded the displays across the board, leaving the ship floating in the black in more ways than one.

“Michelle!”

“Rebooting, sir! Something overloaded everything we had. The system shut down to keep from burning out.”

“Check the recordings just before everything went white. Find out what the hell caused it.”

“Aye, sir,” she said, calling up the files quickly.

Pinpointing the center of the blast wasn’t hard. It could be seen with the naked eye at more than three light-minutes. Winger quickly focused on that point and ran the image for a few seconds before the blast while everyone watched with wide eyes and hearts beating like jackhammers.

They watched as the screens showed a sudden explosion of Doppler-shifted energy as six ships lost warp stability and dropped into real space. One of the ships had been in formation behind another and a beam of energy had lanced out from it with a maelstrom of fury that utterly annihilated anything ahead. The resulting explosion made their pulse torpedoes look like small potatoes and left one Drasin ship as little more than cosmic dust, blowing on a nonexistent wind.

“Well, I think that confirms that they’re using the Alcubierre formulas,” Eric said after a quiet moment.

“Or something close enough as to make no difference,” Roberts agreed. “Sensors online. We still have five enemy warships scattered around us between three and eighteen light-minutes away.”

“Take us full stealth,” Eric ordered. “And Waters? Unlock the t-cannons.”

“Aye, aye, sir,” Waters said with a wide grin.

IMPERIAL DESTROYER
DEMIGOD

“WHAT IN THE Galaxy….”

The trailed-off question caught Ivanth’s attention and he looked over curiously. “What is it?”

“We just lost one of our drones, and five more were dropped from trans-light at the same time,” the confused officer said.

“An ambush?” Ivanth got interested, walking over.

“Unknown, Commander. Each were reporting as normal, then suddenly their drives all destabilized. It looks like an uncontrolled drop from trans-light, Commander. One of the drones was in the path of another.”

Ivanth grimaced. Sure they were just drone ships, and there were plenty more available where they came from, but having an uncontrolled deceleration was one of the nastiest things that could happen. The energy was such that nothing known could shield against it, and in extreme cases it could sterilize a world.

It was extremely unusual for one ship to experience such an occurrence. Six? That wasn’t an accident.

He glanced at the plot for the retreating ship, mentally calculating how far ahead they could let it get before they risked losing it entirely.

“Dispatch two drone squadrons to continue pursuit, then have the
Immortal
and the rest follow us in to investigate.”

“As you say, Commander.”

Ivanth wasn’t sure what had happened, but there was no chance that it was merely a mishap with their drives. The drones under his current command were all second generation, produced directly by the original they’d discovered and recoded to serve the Empire. Second- and third-generation drones weren’t susceptible to many faults, unlike fourth- and later-generations. One drive failure? Sure, even a couple, but six was beyond the laws of probability.

The
Demigod
and the
Immortal
commanded their respective drone forces to slow from warp in a controlled fashion as they entered the region of space where the incident had occurred.

“Active trans-light pulse!”

Ivanth spun. “Are we being scanned?”

“No, Commander. It was too brief. That would only have been enough to give very basic information, Sir. Location and heading data at most.”

“Targeting pulse, then. Did we get an origin?”

“No. Basic heading, nothing more.”

“Return pulse along that heading,” Ivanth ordered.

“Initiating pulse…nothing, no…wait, faint echo, Commander. Almost not there. Can’t lock its location in. It’s just too faint.”

“Someone’s out here,” Ivanth said softly, “and they’re running very dark.”

“Trans-light pulse! Multiple trans-light pulses!”

“Locate and identify origin!”

“Originating….” The man trailed off, looking confused. “Commander, the pulses are located on our drone ships.”

“What?”

“Drones eight through twelve just exploded! No signs of cause!”

Ivanth turned and stared at the big display, eyes wide as four of his drones were just turned into expanding vapor clouds before his eyes.
What did we fly into? A minefield?

That was just stupid to the point of insanity. No one would lay a mine field this far out in deep space.

Would they?

N.A.C.S.
ODYSSEY

“UNREAL,” WATERS WHISPERED, almost unable to believe what he’d just seen. Hell, what he had just done.

Eric was hard pressed to argue. The transition cannons added to the
Odyssey
during the last refit had worked beautifully, allowing the
Odyssey
to engage targets as far away as a full astronomical unit in
real time
. The nuclear-fused munitions fired from the cannons were transitioned by a similar mechanism as the transition drive itself, targeted via tachyon pulse, and reappeared
inside
the enemy ships just in time to explode.