Shadow Space Chronicles 1: The Fallen Race (3 page)

Lucius winced.  “A week is a long time without shields or defenses.”

Lieutenant Naevius nodded slowly.  It looked like a huge effort for him to lift his head back up, “I would suggest towing the fighters out of the ship, except we'd have to cut away several bulkheads.  I think though that it would be faster just to clean out the aft track.”

The fighter crews took the worst losses in many battles.  Of the two squadrons--twelve fighters total--only three craft had returned to the
War Shrike
before the hit that smashed the launch tubes.  The others, to include both squadron commanders, had boarded the
Augustus.

Lucius swept his eyes across the department heads, “We've been through a good deal.  I won't lie and say we're safe.  By disregarding the Admiral's orders, we're doing the unthinkable.”  He felt the ghost of his father's treason as he said that.  He knew, without question, that many of his fellow officers had expected such action of him long before.  “We've been through hell together.  And whatever anyone might say about the decision to disregard those orders, it is my decision and it will be me who will accept the consequences.”

He stood, “Gentlemen, you are dismissed.  Major Proscia, please stay after.”

Lucius watched them depart; they looked like the walking dead, with hollow eyes and exhausted expressions, but they moved with purpose.  He turned his gaze on the Marine commander.  The silence drew out as they studied each other.

Proscia was short and broad of shoulders.  Bushy white eyebrows overhung icy blue eyes.  He kept his white hair cropped close.  He wore the perfectly starched uniform of the Imperial Marines.  At full strength, he'd commanded sixty-four Marines aboard the ship.  After this last battle and the previous engagements, his two platoons were down to fifteen men each.

“You were quiet during the meeting, Major.”

“
Not much reason to speak, sir.”  His calm voice could have come from a recording.  Not for the first time, Lucius wished he were a psychic and could read the Marine's mind.

“
I need to know how you feel about—”

“
If you're worried about some kind of mutiny by my boys, you need not, Baron.”  The Major said.  “Our loyalty is to the ship and you.  It has been since you pulled us out of Danar.”  The Major rapped his knuckles on the table.  “It was a bastard like Stravatti that ordered a ground assault there, and it was you and your crew who sent shuttles down for the survivors, against orders.”

The Major smiled coldly, “As to what I feel about leaving Nova Roma?  I can’t do anything about it, sir.  I’ve been with you long enough to know you don’t plan to let the Chxor do as they want, but…”  The Major’s smile died, “It’s been seven years of fighting.  We had two years of peace before the Chxor invaded.  Four years of war and expansion before that.  On and off, I think I’ve fought for thirty of my forty years in the service.”

Lucius opened his mouth, but the Major raised a hand, “Let me finish, sir.  I was in on the invasion of Ghornath Prime, where we sacked an allied planet and left it defenseless.  I was part of the infiltration teams we sent against the Saragossa to draw the Chxor away from our borders.  I’ve done some pretty terrible things in the name of the Empire.” He closed his eyes, “Frankly, sir, I’m tired.  More than that, I’m ashamed of some of the things I’ve done in the service.  There's a big part of me that doesn't trust
any
senior officers right now... but I trust you, sir.”

The Baron stood, “Thank you, Major.”  He cleared his throat, “Now that we’ve made orbit, we’ll begin operations on the moon.  I’ll want some of your men to set up a base camp.”

The Marine nodded.  “It would do the men good to get down on a planet.  I can get the men ready and we’ll do our best, sir.”

“
Excellent.”  Lucius smiled, “Major—“

Alarms began to wail.

Lucius bit back a curse.  He and Proscia hurried to their battle stations.

***

Lucius stepped onto the bridge.  He moved to the command chair and brought up his display.  The
War Shrike
was in orbit above the nameless planet.  “What’s our status?’

“
Primary power systems are down, engines are down, shields are down, weapons are down,” Ensign Tascon spoke with a sneer.

Lucius turned cold eyes on the Ensign.  Tascon had transferred aboard the
War Shrike
from the
Augustus
, and it seemed some of Commodore Torrelli's views on Lucius had come with him.  Either that, or he severely overestimated his own position.

Lucius held the Ensign's gaze until the younger man looked away.  The medics had told him just before the meeting that Reese still lived.  Hopefully he'd be back in his normal place soon.  Until then, the Ensign would have to do.

He shook off those thoughts and looked at the sensor display.   He checked it twice before he pressed a stud.  “Naevius, are you near Flight Operations?”

“
Yes sir, I’m looking at it on screen.  How’d we miss this?”

Lucius raised an eyebrow and gazed at Tech Brunetti.

“Sir, it was on the far side of the moon.  It appears to be in low orbit, which just now brought it around to our side.  We couldn’t see it, even if we had all our sensors up.”  The technician shook his head, “I should have asked for an approach that let us get a look.”

Lucius shook his head, “Not your fault.” He stared at his screen for a long minute.  The damaged sensors gave little data.  “What can you get from the computers?”

“Looks like a battleship, sir.  Maybe a battlecruiser.  Computers are having difficulty identifying the origin, it’s been damaged and I'm not getting a lot to work with,” Tech Brunetti said.

“
Captain, we can launch the shuttle to check it out,” Lieutenant Naevius said.

“
No, Lieutenant.  Just because it doesn’t show power signatures, it doesn’t mean it isn’t armed.”  Lucius brought up the sensor data on his own console. “Launch one of our recon drones.” 

Tech Brunetti winced, “It’s our last one, sir—“

“And if we’re not destroyed by that ship, we can recover it.”

There was a few seconds wait.  A few minutes after launch the probe flooded the bridge with information.

The Ghornath battlecruiser lay at rest, on a lower orbit than the
War Shrike. 
It seemed to all intents and purposes abandoned and lifeless.  “Lieutenant Naevius, I’ll have the recon drone turned over to your control.  Try to get me as much information on that ship as possible.”

Ensign Tascon spoke up, his voice tight with nervousness, “Sir, what should we do?”

Lucius looked up at the communications officer, “Ensign Tascon, there’s not much we can do.  If their ship’s in any better shape than ours I can’t tell.”  If they weren’t… well, a Desperado-class battleship was only slightly more powerful than a Ghornath battlecruiser.  The
War Shrike
could take higher accelerations and was bolstered by more powerful weapons, although they were considerably fewer than what the Ghornath battlecruiser would mount.

Of course, intact did not really describe the
War Shrike
.  With no shields and the weapons systems doubtful at best, Lucius figured he'd do as much good out on the hull and throwing rocks as going to battlestations.  “Commander Harbach, I need you to look at your repeater—”

Harbach interrupted him in a nasal whine, “I’m busy down here! These idiots nearly lost containment on the reactor just a few minutes ago.  I may have to shut everything down.  You would be advised to conserve power and air—”

“Commander Harbach!” Lucius barked, jamming his finger on the override switch.  He waited for a moment in silence.  “Air will not be an issue, but we have a vessel and I need your opinion of it.  I need an estimate of its status.  Turn your attention to the repeater.”  He removed his finger from the switch and took controlled breaths.

A few seconds later, Naevius’s recon drone circled the battlecruiser.  It beamed sensor data to the
War Shrike
.  He reported in audibly as well.  “Some life signs, port engine core destroyed, weapons systems inoperative, communication’s nodule appears to be completely destroyed.  The shield coils look to be intact, but they’ve no power to use them, both reactors are gone, completely destroyed.”  There was a long pause, “You know, some of the damage looks to have originated from the inside.”

“
Secondary explosions?” Lucius asked.

“
No, no, the damage is all wrong for that!” Harbach interjected.  “The engineering sections are nowhere near the external hits they've taken.  Far more likely to be an attempt to scuttle, you know, or maybe sabotage the vessel.”

Lucius nodded.  He opened another channel, “Major Proscia, I need you to prep a boarding party, it looks like you’ll be going to the surface some other time.”  He thought for a moment.  “Initial entry team as a scouting operation only.  I need to be kept informed, try to use non-lethal force when possible.”

“Captain, you remember what we did at Ghornath Prime, correct?” Ensign Tascon said.  Tascon's Adams-apple bobbed nervously.  “We didn’t exactly make any friends after our victory there.”

Lucius felt his lip curl up in disgust.  “Might as well call it what it was.  The fight‘s sole purpose was to loot the Ghornath technology base.  We betrayed our allies to buy ourselves some more time against our enemies.”  The
War Shrike
herself had engines, weapons, and power plants built off technology stolen from the Ghornath.  “We owe them for that.  Perhaps we can make some of that right.”

***

Lucius stood over the massive, bullet riddled corpses of the Ghornath, and wondered how things had gone so horribly wrong.

Of course, he didn’t really stand there on the alien ship.  He sat on the edge of his command seat, and stared at the projected holograms from the marine boarding team.  He watched and let Major Proscia do his job.  Lucius knew his own skills; commanding a boarding operation was a task he knew Major Proscia would handle far more effectively.

The camera feed from the Marines' helmets shunted into the ships computer.  That feed combined with shipboard sensors developed a three-dimensional overlay of the vessel.

As a courtesy, Major Proscia relayed that to Lucius, keeping him informed of the operation.  “Looks like Ghornath weapons,” the NCO in charge of the team spoke, his voice seemed close.  “From the way they lay… they killed each other.”

Lucius nodded, it looked more and more like sabotage--or perhaps--a mutiny.

“Proceeding deeper into the ship, heading towards the bridge.”  The view expanded as the team of Marines proceeded deeper into the ship, the sensors on their suits gathering information on the environment around them.  “There’s a group of heat signatures ahead.”

A harsh, guttural bark issued from the corridor ahead.  The computer translated it, even as the NCO responded to the challenge, “My name is Sergeant Govi, I’m—“

A rattle of weapons fire and a hail of bullets ended the brief confrontation.  “Returning fire!”  The repeater view altered, quickly forming a close overlay of the area.  Enemy heat signatures appeared and faded as the Marines returned fire.  A cluster of them on the bridge surged forward.  They charged into the weapons fire of the boarding team.  Lucius shook his head at the waste.  They weren’t here to fight, these Ghornath had thrown their lives away for nothing.

“
We’ve secured the bridge, multiple enemy casualties, most of them are dead.  One Marine wounded, we’ve performed first line aid.  We need a medic ASAP.”

Lucius spoke, “Major Proscia, we’ll send the shuttle back immediately.”

“Thank you, sir.  The medic team is a priority, but I’d like to get more personnel in there to secure the area.  We still don’t know what’s going on, and the situation is likely to get more confused rather than less.” Major Proscia’s voice was steady, but a rough edge of excitement lurked just under his words.

Lucius got a jolt as he realized that this was what the Major lived for.  For him, the prospect of a dangerous boarding operation must be what commanding a ship in battle was to Lucius.

“Very well, Major.  Have any of your personnel you’re sending assemble at the shuttle airlock.  Lieutenant Naevius is standing by.”

“
Yes, Captain.  I’ll be going over myself to maintain better control.  We’re boarding the shuttle now.”

Lucius realized the other Marines must have been waiting.  “Lieutenant Naevius here, sir.  They’ve been standing in their gear waiting outside the airlock.”  There was a pause, and Lieutenant Naevius’s voice was slightly more restrained, “Uh, Major Proscia informs me he’s ready to go.”

“Very well, Lieutenant, take them over.”

***

“
Well, Captain, I’ve got some organization here, finally.” Major Proscia said, a couple hours later.

“
Do you know what happened yet?” Lucius asked.  He felt a little light-headed and he fought to keep his eyes open.  He couldn’t afford to sleep now, too many lives hung on his decisions.  Lucius had already taken stimulants twice now, he didn't want to have to take them again.  He hated the jittery, disjointed feeling the drugs gave him.