Rebellion of Stars (Starship Blackbeard Book 4) (23 page)

She touched her ear to activate the com link. “You ready, boys?” Nyb Pim and Carvalho answered in the affirmative. “All right then. Go!”

Tolvern flattened herself. The Hroom behind her let loose seconds later. Nearly a dozen rifles targeted the machine-gun nest and the guard tower. A split second later came the heavier thump, thump, thump of Carvalho’s machine gun in the tree.

“Got him!” he said over the com.

She lifted her head. The gun barrel behind the sandbags tilted skyward. Now tracer bullets from Carvalho’s gun slammed into the tower itself.

“Going in,” she told Nyb Pim. “Don’t shoot me in the back.”

The assault rifles behind her fell silent. She jumped up with an encouraging shout and ran toward the still-open gates. Her three Hroom companions followed. A quick glance behind showed other Hroom pouring on the road from the ditch.

The human in the sandbag bunker slumped over the back end of his gun, which had sent the barrel skyward. Large-caliber bullets riddled his body. Never stood a chance, poor bugger.

So far, not a single response from the enemy base. Carvalho had taken out the machine gun in the first moments and now kept hitting the guard tower. He didn’t have unlimited bullets—it was no mean feat to haul those ammo cans dozens of miles through the brush—but this was no time to conserve. Take the base, and they’d get their hands on everything they needed.

Tolvern and her three companions burst through the open gates. The base was several hundred yards wide, with two long barracks on the right side, a control tower with an empty helipad in the center, and to the left, a pair of hangars flanked by the same sort of windowless concrete dormitories that housed slaves on the plantations.

Three pale-skinned Hroom ducked their heads and ran across the open space between the two barracks. One of the rebel Hroom fighters lifted her gun, but Tolvern ordered her to stand down. They weren’t going to shoot unarmed base workers, especially not when they had so many other objectives. First, the guard post.

An external metal staircase climbed to the top of the post in a series of switchbacks comprising three separate landings. Several other Hroom from the ditch were now entering the base, and here they met their first resistance. A small lorry with oversized mud tires rolled from one of the hangars. Two men stood in the back, leaned over the cab, and fired. Rebel Hroom threw themselves to the ground and returned fire.

Tolvern left this fight to others and moved quickly to secure the metal staircase. She got on the com link to Carvalho. “I’m coming up. Hold your fire.”

The gunfire halted from outside the base. She positioned two of the Hroom at the first landing while she continued up with her last fighter. She tried the heavy metal door at the top. Locked. So much for the hope that the enemy had continued their series of defensive blunders.

She removed a grenade with a timed charge, set the timer for ten seconds, and activated it. Then she and her companion ran down to the next landing, crouched with covered ears, and braced themselves. Bullets pinged off the metal railing near her head.

Then came the explosion. It shook the landing until Tolvern thought she’d miscalculated, and the entire building would collapse, staircase and all. But when the shaking stopped, it was still standing. Only the door was damaged.

It had blown inward and lay smoking on the floor inside the guard tower. She grabbed her companion, and they charged up. Maybe the guards were dead, maybe not, but she wouldn’t take chances. They came in guns firing.

At nothing, it turned out. All of Carvalho’s shooting after taking out the sandbagged gun below had been wasted. There was nobody manning the guard post. Someone had slept in, ventured off with the security forces, or taken their coffee break without leaving a replacement. There was a heavy machine gun mounted on the exterior wall, together with several ammo cans.

Tolvern and her companion dismounted the gun and shifted it to a loophole on the inner wall of the tower. The Hroom dragged over ammo cans from the corner, and Tolvern pulled back the bolt and aimed the gun toward the interior of the base.

The small lorry and its men had kept the rebels pinned near the entrance. Some of her fighters had taken refuge behind a small shed, while two others lay sprawled and motionless in the dirt, their weapons fallen. Gunned down by the enemy. Other rebels had been unable to enter at all. Meanwhile, several humans deeper in the base seemed to be organizing a defense of humans and their Hroom slaves, using the lorry as a shield.

Tolvern aimed at the lorry and let loose. The gunner went first, and then she tore up the engine block, shredded the tires, and battered down the windshield. She swept the gun to the left and right until she’d cut down or scattered all the defenders.

Their way now clear, the rest of the rebels entered the base. Tolvern stayed at the gun until Carvalho and Brockett entered a few minutes later hefting the machine gun and ammo. After they had it set up on a tripod, Tolvern left her companion in the guard tower and went down to join them. They now had three working machine guns, including the one captured outside the gates.

The gun at the guard tower kept them covered as Tolvern and Carvalho moved toward the center of the base, tossing grenades and firing at anything that moved. It took less than an hour to overrun the entire base. The attack left fifteen dead enemies, captured forty prisoners, and sent another twenty or thirty humans and Hroom fleeing in lorries down the road on the opposite side of the base. Tolvern lost four Hroom from her own force, with three others suffering light wounds.

Carvalho had pinned down the last two surviving enemies and was still trying to force a surrender, when Tolvern called Pez Rykan.

“We’ve got the base,” she told him. “Not as much gear here as I thought, but we’re still turning over rocks looking for it all. But we’ve got maybe a hundred more guns and plenty of ammo. Some new heavy weapons, too. Captured two lorries, but they’re shot up and in need of repair. Are you still pinned down?”

“No. The fight is already over. We were forced to withdraw.”

“What? How many did you lose?”

“Several dozen. Perhaps a hundred.”

Her stomach sank. “I told you not to fight, I told you to pin them down as long as you could and get out of there.”

“I had six guns and a job to do. I had no choice.”

“And where is the enemy now? Still blocked, or did they muscle through on their way to the lowlands?”

“No, they are driving back to the base. They turned around, and we couldn’t hold them. We knocked over trees in the road,” the Hroom chief continued. “Then, when they approached, we shot at them and tried to block their escape. But they seemed to understand this—I don’t know how, but they guessed our deception. We couldn’t get enough trees onto the road or force the enemy to take cover in the forest. They fought their way out again.”

They must have received word from the base. Tolvern had hit hard and fast, had captured the provisional base commander within twenty minutes of Carvalho’s first shots, but not, it would seem, before he sent a panicked message to the assault team. The commander of the assault team had reacted coolly under fire and fought his way out before the trap could be fully sprung. And now, the enemy was rushing back to recapture the base. Somehow, Tolvern had to hold it, or the entire battle would be lost.

“How many enemies are we talking about?” she asked. “Couple of hundred?”

“More like five or six hundred, I would say. Plenty of lorries and heavy weapons. Now you see why we couldn’t hold them.”

Her mouth went dry. “That many?”

“Did all of your forces survive?” Pez Rykan asked. “How many do you have left to resist them?”

Tolvern had already counted in her head. “Counting both humans and Hroom? We have sixteen.”

Chapter Twenty-four

Drake’s forces and the lord admiral’s converged on Hot Barsa within hours of each other. Captain Lindsell’s powerful cruiser fleet made an in-flight rendezvous with
Dreadnought
, while
Blackbeard
came in behind.

Meanwhile, Rutherford had shifted
Vigilant
into a support role between Fort Gamma and Fort Epsilon, disguising his ship’s crippled engines while also shoring up the planetary defenses. Rutherford’s frigates set up position on the flanks, and a pair of destroyers laid down mines to slow the enemy advance. Vargus’s mercenary fleet arrived next, and Drake ordered her to protect
Vigilant
’s rear from Fort Alpha, which had never been conquered and could provide nasty surprises in the upcoming battle.

Drake thought they were well positioned even against such a massive force as Malthorne’s. If not for victory, then at least a bloody stalemate. If Malthorne weren’t so pigheaded, he might try something other than a frontal assault, but he seemed to have no other plan than to come in hard and fast. He didn’t bother to cloak himself, either, just made a straight run for the planet, a single hammer blow meant to end the battle in the first encounter. It reminded Drake of the Hroom style of fighting. Apply overwhelming force to a single spot and keep pounding away until you either won or were utterly vanquished.

Why was Malthorne so aggressive? Probably Tolvern had a good deal to do with it.

Her rebellion was spreading its tendrils through the sugar estates of Hot Barsa. Malthorne would be itching to get to the surface to burn out the slave revolt before it was too late. Drake tried to make contact with Tolvern on the surface. Whatever she was doing was working. He needed her to keep fighting until
Dreadnought
had been destroyed or driven off. When that was done, he’d get the away team out of there and leave the revolt to its own devices.

But he couldn’t reach her. Why not? Tolvern had already contacted Gamma and
Vigilant
on multiple occasions. Now she’d gone dark just when she should have been checking in. Last they’d heard, she was preparing to fight security forces in a major battle. Had it gone wrong?

Drake didn’t have long to worry. The combined Malthorne-Lindsell fleet began its run to Hot Barsa.
Blackbeard
was a few hours behind. She rendezvoused with the final two cruisers of the rebel fleet: HMS
Richmond
, captained by Catherine Caites, and HMS
Calypso
, with the steady Philip Potterman at the helm. The cruisers came with a partial task force of support craft, including a corvette, a frigate, and three destroyers.

All in all, Drake’s fleet was too powerful to ignore. Even as
Dreadnought
approached Hot Barsa, Lindsell sheered away with several craft to protect the battleship’s rear.

Malthorne sent a final, taunting warning. No demand for surrender this time. Only a general broadcast calling on all crews to mutiny. Take back the forts, seize their ships. They’d been coerced into aiding and abetting traitors, and mercy would be provided if they turned toward their rightful king.

This had no effect on the rebel forces. It caused no defections, no additional sabotage. Any hidden enemies had already shown their colors.

Dreadnought
pulled up short as she and Fort Gamma came in range of each other. Malthorne sheered off his remaining torpedo boat to block
Vigilant
, should she come in for an attack. Rutherford had concealed her weakness well. Didn’t do much good, though, as she was unable to fight at this range.

The battleship stood several hundred thousand miles off and heaved a massive missile barrage at the fort from a pair of crotalus batteries. There was too much firepower to fend off with countermeasures, and explosions were soon rocking the fortress. Dexi Gibbs was back in charge, but this time fully armed. In this initial stage, however, she sat and absorbed the punishment. Only when Malthorne tried to sneak through a missile armed with an atomic weapon did defense systems scramble to put it down. They knocked it away before it could do any harm.

That atomic assault had put a lie to Malthorne’s promise of mercy. Breaking through, it would have killed rebels and loyalists alike.

Under cover of
Dreadnought
’s fire, two torpedo boats pulled off from Lindsell’s cruiser fleet, and supported by a missile frigate, made a diving run at Gamma. This forced the commander’s hand. If one of those torpedo boats had another atomic warhead, the result could be disastrous. She unloaded her missile batteries, and then the fort’s cannons, trying to drive off the enemy craft. One of the torpedo boats took damage, and soon both were fleeing back to
Dreadnought
, their mission failed.

Gibbs turned Fort Gamma’s weapons on
Dreadnought
. The battleship swatted away missiles and torpedoes like so many pesky mosquitoes. It looked like she was preparing another run with torpedo boats. Rutherford brought up a frigate and a destroyer and swung them wide to guard against this possibility.
Vigilant
still lingered to the rear.

Meanwhile, Fort Epsilon came into view, but it couldn’t join the battle against
Dreadnought
during the brief minutes when it was in range. Instead, it had its hands full with Fort Alpha—still controlled by loyalists. After weeks of wary truce, the two orbital platforms were now fighting each other. Rutherford sent a destroyer to aid Fort Epsilon, but otherwise kept his forces at the ready.

Drake hailed Caites and Potterman. They split the viewscreen, the young, serious-faced woman Rutherford had elevated next to the craggy-faced war veteran. They were each skilled in their own way, but only a few months ago, Caites had commanded a small torpedo boat, and Potterman had spent his career at the helm of a destroyer. Neither had taken a cruiser into open battle.

“The only way we win is if we get to
Dreadnought
,” Drake said. “Us, Rutherford, and Vargus all at once. Pin her against the forts and finish her. Like a pack of lions bringing down an elephant.”

Caites stared back coolly. “If only the elephant wasn’t guarded by her own lions.”