Original Work Desperate Glory (Morningstar IV)

Chapter Thirty-Six

“It seems one hell of a gamble,” Madeleine observed. “Are you sure the admiral isn’t trying to get you killed?”

Leo shrugged, admiring her naked body as she squatted on the bed. It was a risk, turning their planning session into a sexual liaison, but … it was a risk he chose to take. The discussion he'd had with the staff officers had made it clear that the odds were not in their favour and, depending on how heavily the enemy had fortified Yangtze, there was a very good chance the whole plan would fail spectacularly. Leo disliked the idea of planning for failure – he considered the whole concept defeatist – but the handful of simulations they’d run suggested there were only a handful of points when the whole mission could be aborted, if the enemy proved to be tougher than expected. The worst-case scenarios pointed out that they could get in too deep, before realising they’d bitten off more than they could chew, and get pounded to pieces before they managed to get out again. Leo hoped to hell the enemy weren’t as capable as those simulations suggested. If they were, the entire war was within shouting distance of being lost.

“I don’t think so,” Leo said. “He put his nephew on this ship too.”

“Maybe he wants both of you killed,” Madeleine said. Her tone was light, but there was an edge to it that suggested she wasn’t entirely joking. “You’re both embarrassments as far as he’s concerned.”

Leo considered it for a moment, then shook his head. He had never thought the admiral liked him, and Francis had had plenty of time to whisper poison in his uncle’s ear, but risking ninety starships to get rid of one person struck him as overkill. The admiral had plenty of other options, from reassigning Leo to a larger starship under another captain to simply sending him back home for rest and relaxation. A man with so many strings to pull might even be able to send Leo to a career-ending post on an asteroid mining station. And besides, the admiral wouldn’t intentionally send his nephew to his death.

“I don’t think so,” he repeated. “He’s done everything in his power to give us a fighting chance.”

“Assuming all his assumptions are correct,” Madeleine pointed out. “Remind me what they say about the word assume again?”

“That it makes an ass out of you and me,” Leo said. His instructors had drilled that into his head time and time again, reminding the cadets never to take anything for granted no matter how many times they were assured they could. The intelligence staff had been known to make mistakes, they’d said, and if they’d missed something important – like a whole fleet of battleships lurking under cloak – the fleet would be blown away before they realised how badly they’d screwed up. “We won’t be taking anything for granted.”

He tapped his console, bringing up the latest report from Yangtze. The enemy appeared to have secured the industrial nodes, their owners clearly reluctant to trigger the self-destructs before it was too late, but they’d missed their chance to capture most of the orbital defences. Admiral Blackthrone had destroyed as much as possible, before jumping out, and what had been left behind shouldn’t be much of a problem. It wasn’t clear much the rebels had been able to improve the defences since then, but unless the rebels had something completely new there should be hard limits on just how much they’d been able to bring into the system over the last few weeks. Leo wasn’t expecting anything larger than automated weapons platforms, certainly not prefabricated orbital fortresses. The defence of the planet would rest on the mobile fleet.

Which means we have the edge for once, he told himself, and they’re the ones who’ll be pinned down.

“If everything here is accurate,” he said, “we should be able to get in and out before it’s too late.”

“Yeah,” Madeleine said. “If.”

She scowled. The plan didn’t quite rely on the enemy doing the wrong thing at the wrong time, but if they realised what they were facing and reacted they’d have an excellent chance to drive the relief force away before it was too late. Ironically … if they did that, according to the simulations, they’d actually give the relief force a chance to extract itself before the rebels could blow it to atoms. The rebels might actually decide to accept the challenge and … he gritted his teeth. There would be a moment when the fleet would be dangerously exposed, unable to either attack or retreat, and if the rebels attacked then …

“There’s not much of a choice,” he said. The enemy troops were advancing on Yangtze City. It was just a matter of time before the city, and the PDCs, were taken on the ground. Once they fell … the formal battle would be over. “We act now or we don’t act at all.”

Madeleine leaned back on the bed. “And if the operation fails?”

“Then we’re fucked anyway,” Leo said. “And not in a good way.”

He scowled as he contemplated the starchart. The rebels were advancing into a vacuum. There weren’t anything like enough starships in the neighbouring sectors to do more than slow them down, at least until they reached older fortifications and fleet bases, and even when the navy mobilised it was going to take years for the rebels to be pushed out again. He’d seen some of the more pessimistic projections, the ones that suggested the rebels would have several years to develop the occupied sectors and make full use of captured industrial nodes and local manpower. It was going to be a long hard fight even if the autonomous worlds didn’t switch sides …

And we still don’t know who’s backing the rebels, Leo reminded himself. There could be an entire fleet lurking near Daybreak itself, just waiting for the chance to strike.

Madeleine met his eyes. “I will carry out my duty, if you’re wondering,” she said, tartly. “But I’m not happy about this mission.”

“Neither am I,” Leo admitted. The plan was a good one. They’d run it through a dozen simulations, each one giving the rebels a fair edge, and the good guys had won more often than they’d lost. But who would care about simulated battles, when the real engagement was lost? “If we win, we buy time and knock the rebels back; if we lose, we lose everything.”

“Not quite everything,” Madeleine agreed. “But yeah, it will be bad.”

Leo snorted. “Do you think you made the wrong choice?”

“I swore an oath,” Madeleine said. She stretched, drawing attention to her breasts. “And yeah, I could have taken your offer of early retirement and never had to go home, but that oath meant something to me. How about you?”

“I could have refused federal service,” Leo said. There was no penalty for not working to earn citizenship, save one. You wouldn’t be a citizen. “Or I could have signed up for something, anything, that didn’t require me to put my ass in harm’s way. Digging ditches, perhaps, or something – anything – along those lines. Instead …”

He shrugged. “I knew the job was dangerous when I applied for it.”

His lips twitched. There had been a couple of cadets, in his first year, who’d acted as if they didn’t know what they’d let themselves in for, when they’d joined the navy. It wasn’t as if they’d walked into a recruiting station and been sweet-talked into signing up either. They were attending the Naval Academy! The other cadets had joked that they’d thought they were visiting a hotel, or an adventure camp, but … he shook his head. Neither cadet had made it through the first year.

“You could have joined a freighter crew,” he pointed out. “Why didn’t you?”

“I needed to prove myself,” Madeleine said. “I earned my place here. And just because some uniformed fool thinks I don’t belong … I’m not going to leave.”

She pushed him down and straddled him, rubbing her vagina against his manhood. Leo felt himself stiffen, his body all too aware that there might never be a second chance. If the admiral’s plan went according to schedule, they’d be departing tomorrow and then … victory or death. She pinned him to the mattress as she lowered herself onto him, moving with increasing speed as he thrust into her. It was wild and abandoned, without any commitment …

His wristcom bleeped.

Madeleine snarled. “I’m going to kill whoever called you.”

Leo snorted. He knew exactly what she meant, but ignoring a call was asking for trouble. It wasn’t as if they were on shore leave, or even in their cabin on Morningstar Base, or somewhere – anywhere – where they could expect to be left alone. The admiral’s makeshift base was supposed to be off the books, but they couldn’t take it for granted. The enemy might be preparing a spoiler attack even now, their ships readying themselves to jump in, shoot off a few dozen missiles, and jump out again. It was what he would do.

He tapped his wristcom. “Yes?”

“Sir,” Anderson said. Her tone was professional, businesslike. Leo still had to remind himself, sharply, not to bite her head off. She hadn’t known what he was doing, when she’d made the call. “The remaining ships have arrived, along with the stockpiles.”

“Distribute the stockpiles as planned,” Leo ordered. The ships had arrived earlier than expected … probably a good sign. “And inform the senior officers that they’re invited to join me on Gypsy, two hours from now.”

He closed the connection. “It wasn’t her fault.”

Madeleine grinned, her hips starting to move again. “I know,” she said. “But …”

She moved faster, riding him until he exploded. She sagged, her weight pressing him down … Leo kissed her forehead, feeling a twinge of warmth and something he didn’t care to look at too closely, even as she rolled off him and lay beside him. He’d never had any real illusions about any of his love affairs, except Gayle, and she’d … he wondered, suddenly, if Gayle had returned to Yangtze. Probably, if he was any judge. She’d loved her homeworld so much she’d been prepared to commit high treason to save it.

Why does treason never prosper, he asked himself. His history and moral philosophy teacher had been fond of saying that, using it to explain why so many societies had fallen into self-inflicted ruin. Because if it prosper, none dare call it treason.

“You know, afterwards, we could go on leave together,” Leo said. “I’m sure they owe us both some time off.”

Madeleine elbowed him. “You know better,” she said. “And really …”

She stood and headed for the shower. Leo admired her toned legs and shapely rear, feeling a twinge of … he wasn’t sure. He liked her and respected her and they had fun together and … was there anything else there? Or was it just a shared desire not to be alone, to lose their fears in orgasm and then spend the night together? Or … he didn’t know. They’d be reassigned soon enough and then … their relationship might end, with a whimper rather than a bang. He told himself he shouldn’t expect too much. Their relationship was alarmingly close to breaking regulations …

And technically it is, he reminded himself. I got promoted.

Madeleine didn’t say anything as she emerged from the shower, dressed with practiced efficiency, and left the compartment. Leo wondered what she was thinking as he forced himself to stand and stagger into the shower, then decided it didn’t matter. They would be jumping out tomorrow, heading out to face the enemy one final time … no, it wouldn’t be the last time. The simulations were useless when it came to projecting the course of the war, because they knew very little about who was backing the rebels, but it was clear the war was going to last for years.

Unless the rebels surrender, Leo mused. And they’re in it too deep to give up now.

He washed himself quickly, then changed into a clean uniform and made his way to the makeshift briefing compartment. There was barely any room for more than a handful of officers and a holoprojector, but … he considered and then dismissed the idea of calling Pompey and asking to borrow the admiral’s briefing chambers. Better to have most of his officers attend via hologram than risk having them all on one ship, when the shit hit the fan. Leo understood the value of face-to-face discussions – it was easy to miss nuance when you couldn’t quite see the speaker – but it was better to keep his officers apart than risk losing them all to an enemy strike.

His lips twisted. All the old jokes about unit efficiency doubling when the senior officers were kidnapped and NCOs had to take over had been funny, until he’d become an officer himself …

And no doubt there were crew on Waterhen who distrusted me at first, Leo mused. They knew I’d barely left the academy. They had good reason for doubting me.

He poured himself a mug of coffee, then added two more when Flower and Boothroyd were shown into the compartment. “Did everything go as planned?”

“More or less,” Flower said. “We stripped out most of the supplies, though, and I doubt we can maintain our current operational tempo for more than a couple of weeks without resupply.”

“I suspect it will be a while before we get any resupply,” Leo said. In hindsight, it might have been a good idea to set up more secret supply depots. “The entire sector may be abandoned.”

Boothroyd swore. “It’s that bad?”

“Daybreak barely has any idea what’s happened out here,” Leo said. “The navy won’t be sending reinforcements until they know we need them.”

He brought up the starchart and cursed under his breath. The navy was supposed to go on the offensive at all times, yet … where were they meant to attack? Yangtze? There weren’t many other targets in the sector worthy of their attention and attacking worlds like Yalta or New Dublin would be nothing more than pointless spite. The navy would need to prepare for a long drawn-out conflict, sending scout ships beyond the Rim, while uneasily watching for someone preparing to put a knife in their back. Admiral Blackthrone’s counterattack was about the only move left to him, and the rebels knew it. They could be preparing to meet it even as Leo made his final preparations.

We may never beat them completely, he mused. As long as their bases remain undiscovered, they will be able to keep harassing us for centuries.

The rest of his officers assembled, Madeleine joining him in person while the rest attended via hologram. Leo took a breath, eyes darting from overlapping image to overlapping image. The officers looked wary, their faces grim. They’d seen the remains of the admiral’s task force the moment they’d arrived, a demoralising sight under any circumstances. They would be more than human if they weren’t worried about the same thing happening to them. And their vessels lacked the weapons, armour and crew of proper warships.

“Attention on deck,” Leo said, preparing himself to confront the elephant in the room. “The rebels took on Admiral Blackthrone’s squadron and beat the shit out of it. They caught the admiral by surprise, pinned him down, and battered his ships to pieces. There’s no point in pretending the rebels didn’t win the engagement, because they did. The admiral was very lucky to get his ships out before it was too late.”

His remaining ships, he corrected himself, mentally. The admiral’s squadron should have been invincible. There shouldn’t have been any threat in the sector capable of taking it on and winning. The rebels had proved otherwise. He was damn lucky to get any ships out of the cauldron before …

“We lost a battle, but we have lost battles before. We have not lost the war. We have never lost a war and we’re not about to start now. It will be a long conflict, and there will be many defeats as well as victories, but we will emerge victorious once again.”

He paused. “The admiral has put together a battle plan,” he added. “I’ve uploaded the details to your datacores. Some ships will be reassigned to the admiral’s squadron, others will remain under my command. The operation will be risky, but I have faith that we can pull it off.

“Our primary goal is to evacuate as many of our people from Yangtze as possible. Our secondary goal is to prove, once and for all, that the rebels are not invincible. They are tough, as we have seen, and cunning too … but so are we. They have their tricks, we have ours. We have beaten them before and we’ll beat them again.”

The words hung in the air for a long cold moment. Leo knew his officers would have their doubts. Yangtze would be heavily defended and if the rebels reacted quickly, they might manage to slam the door closed before the squadron could get in and out again. The operation combined the worst aspects of a hit-and-run mission with the most dangerous moments of a planetary invasion, and … Leo cut off that line of thought before it could get any further. They had their orders. They needed to carry them out.

“Read the plan, then make your preparations accordingly,” Leo said. His eyes lingered on Madeleine for a long moment. “We jump out at 0700 tomorrow. Good luck to us all.”

He paused, once again. “Dismissed.”

Madeleine glanced at him, her face grim, but she didn’t speak until the holograms were gone. “See you on the other side.”

“Yeah,” Leo said. There was no time for a private chat, not any longer. “See you.”

 

Chapter Thirty-Seven: Admiral Blackthrone/Gayle

Admiral Alexander Blackthrone stood in the observation blister, hands clasped behind his back, and wondered which of the stars in front of him was Yangtze’s primary star. It was impossible to pick out a bigger star from the sea of stars, even though the task force was only a light-year from its target. They’d made three jumps, carefully calibrated to ensure they lost anyone trying to track them, before making the final hop to the RV point and … he sucked in his breath, feeling cold determination warring with fear in his gut. The coming engagement had too many moving parts for anyone’s peace of mind.

His stomach churned, a grim reminder that his nerve wasn’t what it had been. It had been easy to be brave when he’d commanded the most powerful ship in the sector, surrounded by other starships almost as powerful. His war record had been earned, he knew, but he’d always faced enemies he’d known to be inferior. A rebellious world was unlikely to be able to match Daybreak in either firepower or raw numbers, he’d learnt through experience, and it had bred a certain kind of contempt that had cost him dear. It was one of the reasons he welcomed a court martial even through it could easily end with the hangman’s noose, or a gift of a pistol with a single bullet and an unsubtle suggestion he could and should regain his honour by putting the pistol to his head and pulling the trigger. A full discussion of just what had gone so badly wrong would embarrass his family, as well as himself, but it would hopefully teach his successors the dangers of underestimating the rebels. Daybreak could no longer assume it had the edge in any successive conflict and the humiliation of a court martial was a small price to pay for drumming that awareness into the head of any officer worthy of the name.

If this works, at least my court martial will not be a foregone conclusion, he told himself, although he knew better. And if it doesn’t …

He hesitated, staring at his own reflection in the transparent blister. The operation was justified. His reasoning was sound. He did need to get the governor and his staff out – and prove the rebels could be beaten – and his logic held up, even to close examination. His staff, permitted to speak freely, had not come up with any good reasons not to proceed. And yet, he was left wondering if he was committing himself because he knew it needed to be done, or because he wanted to hit back before he returned home to face the music. He wanted – he needed – a victory and yet … was it worth the cost?

His wristcom bleeped. “Sir, the task force is in position, awaiting your command.”

“Understood.” Alexander took one last look at the stars, then headed for the hatch. “I’m on my way.”

The hatch hissed open, then closed behind him as he walked onwards. The battlecruiser’s mood felt ugly, her crew either preparing themselves to tear into the enemy or fearful of what might happen when the two fleets converged once again. Moral was in the crapper, Alexander knew, and he could hardly blame the crew. They’d known they were invincible until they weren’t, until they’d been outthought and outfought, and now … it would be a long time before matters returned to normal. The only real antidote was victory, as complete as possible, and that wasn’t going to come in a hurry. He told the part of him that wondered if it was going to come at all to shut up.

“Admiral on deck,” Syeda said, as Alexander strode into the CIC. The main display was lit up, forty-one icons surrounding Pompey … their ECM in deception mode. The fleet looked a little too impressive to be real, but that was part of the plan. The rebels would be wary of a fleet that might actually exist. “Sir, all ships are ready to jump.”

“Noted.” Alexander took his seat and examined the display. The fleet was as strong as it would ever be, at least until reinforcements arrived. They’d repaired as much as possible, then reloaded magazines and bolted missile pods to their hulls. If they’d had a few more weeks … he shook his head, dismissing the thought. They had very little time before the rebels resumed the offensive and thrust towards the core. “Open a channel to the entire fleet.”

“Channel open, sir.”

Alexander took a breath. “The rebels think we’re scared, because they caught us by surprise,” he said. “They think they hit us so hard we can no longer hit back. They’re wrong. Today, we face them on even terms; today, we show them what we’re made of. Today …”

He paused. “Daybreak expects every man will do his duty,” he said, tapping his console to start the countdown. “All ships, jump on my command.”

***

Coming home felt strange to Gayle Bridgerton, even though she’d known Yangtze had changed remarkably in the two years since she’d been forced to flee. Her father’s estates had been confiscated, of course, and most of her friends and relatives had loudly disowned the rebels in hopes of not being considered rebels themselves, and Yangtze City had expanded so rapidly she no longer knew the place, but that wasn’t what made her feel strange. It was living on a planetary surface again, after spending years in space. It was …

She frowned as she stood on Freedom’s command deck, watching Commodore Lafarge issue orders to his crew, and the engineers Gayle had brought from their bases further into unexplored territory. Yangtze was a prize, and most of her industrial nodes had been taken intact, but she would tie the fleet down until proper defences could be deployed … she grimaced, wondering if Leo Morningstar was urging his commander to strike hard and fast. Gayle had had plenty of time to study the young man, before he’d realised what she truly was, and she knew he was aggressive, as well as no great respecter of rank and title. If he was still alive, and Gayle was sure he wouldn’t be killed easily, he’d be demanding action or taking it on his own, even if it meant going against his superiors. He was a bloody minded son of a bitch.

And he came very close to killing me, Gayle thought, her heart growing cold. Leo had loved his ship. The idea of throwing her at an orbital battlestation to cover his retreat was one that should never have crossed his mind. It made her wonder what else he would have thrown away, if things had been different. If she’d been the girl she’d pretended to be, would he have gotten bored of her? If …

An alarm chimed. “What’s that?”

Lafarge shot her a sharp look. Gayle shrugged. She was the civilian observer, the leader of her operational group and ambassador to the Cognoscenti, but she was not – in any sense of the word – a military officer. It was not her place to issue orders on his ship and she knew it, but …

“A number of enemy ships have jumped into the system,” Lafarge said, as the display rapidly updated. “At least forty, coming in hard. Admiral Blackthrone has returned for Round Two.”

Gayle frowned. “How can you be sure?”

“The enemy force is commanded by Pompey,” Lafarge told her. His lips curved into a grim smile. “And half of those battleships don’t exist.”

“I see,” Gayle said. She didn’t pretend to understand Daybreak’s politics, in which the official way of doing things was often superseded by an unofficial system designed to make little sense to outsiders, but if the admiral’s flagship was leading the charge it stood to reason the admiral was on her. “And the battleships?”

“They’re too good,” Lafarge explained. “The ECM is excellent. But if they were real battleships they’d be closing the range now, hoping to catch us before we can jump out and run. And that means the admiral is up to something.”

He raised his voice. “Helm, plot an intercept course.”

“Aye, sir.”

“And bring up the gravity generators,” Lafarge added. “We want to pin them down.”

“Aye, sir.”

Gayle frowned as the enemy fleet altered course. “What are they trying to do?”

“Scare us, I suspect.” Lafarge smiled as a dull rumble ran through the ship. “They’re trying to convince us those ships are real, which would dissuade us from trying to chase them out of the system. But if they were real, they’d be hitting us now and the gravity generators would turn into a liability. And they’re not.”

And Leo could be on those ships, Gayle thought, as Lafarge continued to bark orders. What is he doing over there?

She took her seat and forced herself to wait. The war was very far from over and if the enemy were obliging enough to come within shooting range, she wasn’t going to object. It wasn’t as if they could retake the planet. The worst they could do was launch KEWs at targets on the ground and unless they closed the range sharply they were unlikely to hit anything. Anything important, at least. The odds were good they’d hit civilian targets quite by accident. Gayle knew how ruthless Daybreak could be, but even the most sadistic officer would think twice about bombarding the planet at extreme range. It would alienate loyalists, convincing them to switch sides, as well as blackening Daybreak’s reputation in the sector.

If it needs any blackening, she reflected wryly. Her father would never have gotten as far as he had if there hadn’t been a groundswell of hatred and frustration – and desperation. We don’t need to invent any atrocities, or fake them. They do enough on their own.

She sighed, inwardly. The die was cast … in truth, it had been cast when it had become clear that her father’s attempts to put together an association that might have earned them better treatment had failed. Daybreak had to be stopped, no matter the cost, or the entire galaxy would be either frozen in time forever or torn apart by civil war. And if victory cost her life, it was a price she would gladly pay.

Lafarge glanced at her. “We’ll be in intercept position in twenty minutes,” he said. “And then we will see.”

***

“Sir,” Syeda reported. “The enemy fleet is leaving orbit.”

“Good.” Alexander studied the display for a long moment. The rebels hadn’t been fooled by the ECM … either that, or they had a trick or two up their sleeves. “Are all their ships leaving orbit?”

“It appears so,” Syeda said. “They must have a great deal of faith in the orbital defences.”

Alexander wasn’t so sure. Yangtze was important, true, but compared to the rebel fleet her importance was minimal. The rebels could afford to trade Yangtze for what remained of his fleet, if he were willing to make the trade, and they’d come out ahead. Not that he had any intention of making such a trade, when his ships represented the only major formation for several sectors. The only real goal was to give the rebels a bloody nose and make way for Leo Morningstar.

“Deploy two active drones and two passive drones,” he ordered. “If they have any more tricks up their sleeves, I want to know about it.”

“Aye, sir.”

Alexander forced himself to wait as the range slowly started to narrow. The rebels had a slight speed edge over most of his ships, although it was unclear if they knew it. Pompey was supposed to be fast enough to outrun anything she couldn’t kill – a concept that had never been tested in a serious engagement – and given time, she could presumably escape the gravity generators. It was odd that the rebels weren’t bringing them up, given that his fleet could jump out at any moment. Unless they wanted to boast they’d forced him to run. Again.

And those ships are real, he mused. The two active drones had died the moment they flew into enemy weapons range, but they’d lasted long enough to confirm the enemy hadn’t withdrawn their fleet as they’d done at New Dublin. They have more than enough firepower to win the engagement if they trap us in realspace. And they have to know it.

“Admiral,” Syeda reported. “We’re picking up gravity flickers from the enemy fleet.”

Alexander shivered, feeling oddly trapped even through there was plenty of manoeuvring room between the two fleets. “Locate the generators and tag those ships for destruction.”

“Aye, sir.”

His mind raced. It was a shame there was no time to lay a second minefield – and no reason to think the enemy would give chase, if he hinted otherwise. Minefields had been considered expensive wastes of time in most cases, when the bad guys could easily evade them, and Leo Morningstar was the only commander in the last few decades to not only lay a minefield but lure the enemy onto it. That trick wouldn’t work twice, sadly. The rebels would refuse to take the bait if it looked like he were trying to repeat Commander Morningstar’s stunt.

Syeda looked up. “Sir, they’ve pinned us down,” she said. “They’ll be within engagement range in ten minutes …”

Her display sounded the alarm. “Correction. They just opened fire.”

Alexander nodded, keeping his face under right control. The rebels had opened fire at extreme range, which suggested they didn’t consider the range remotely extreme. Daybreak had never produced a long-range missile because it had seemed pointless, but the rebels clearly disagreed … unsurprisingly, he reflected, because they could trap their targets in realspace. There was no time to wait for the analyst staff’s best guesses about missile range …

“Bring us about,” he ordered. The one advantage of the whole affair was that the rebels had trapped themselves in realspace too. “Lock missiles on target, prepare to engage.”

“Aye, sir,” Syeda said.

Alexander kept his thoughts to himself. Standard practice was to keep the range open as much as possible, but lacking any hard data on enemy capabilities meant that trying was asking for trouble. If the new missiles had twice the range of standard weapons, the rebels would be able to hammer his fleet from a safe distance … there was no hard data on how many of the new missiles they could cram into their arsenal ships either. If they were larger than standard missiles … he shook his head. The plan was starting to go off the rails, but it was far from over.

“Entering missile range,” Syeda reported. The enemy missiles were closing in fast. “Missiles locked, ready to fire.”

“Fire,” Alexander ordered.

The fleet fired as one, the converted freighters tossing out a giant volley of missiles. They weren’t proper arsenal ships – Morningstar Base hadn’t had the facilities to tear out the ship’s innards and replace them with missile launchers, loaders and magazines – but they carried enough missiles to give the enemy a very hard time. The ECM might just convince the enemy that they actually were chasing battleships, now they’d spat out a ton of missiles. It wouldn’t last long, but …

He gritted his teeth as the first wave of enemy missiles entered his point defence envelope. This time, his crews hadn’t been caught by surprise; this time, they had full use of their ECM as well as point defence sensors and everything else they’d been unable to use during the first engagement. It helped, a little. The enemy’s long-range missiles didn’t seem to be as manoeuvrable as regular missiles, nor did they have anyone doing the targeting for them at such extreme range. A set of ideas ran through his head and he jotted them down, then forwarded them to the watching picket ships. If he lost the battle, at least his ideas would go back to Daybreak. Hopefully, someone would make use of them.

Pompey shuddered as a missile struck home. Alexander gritted his teeth as alarms howled. The battlecruiser had been hit … not badly, but badly enough. He forced himself to keep his eyes on the overall situation as his ships belched another volley of missiles, trying to keep track of patterns appearing in the display. The enemy gravity generators weren’t behaving as he’d expected … he wasn’t sure if they were shutting them down, to allow the ships to escape, or if they’d come up with something else. It looked as if they were altering the projected field in some way … interesting. They might be able to project a cone of gravitational force, rather than a sphere … worrying, if true. How quickly could they adjust their settings?

The battlecruiser rocked again. The engagement was far from over.

If nothing else, the pickets will report back home, he told himself. The enemy fleet was taking a beating. A rush of savage delight ran through him as a heavy cruiser blew up. And next time, we’ll be ready for them.

***

“Close the range,” Lafarge ordered. There was a hint of surprise in his tone. “If those battleships are real, we have to take them out while we can.”

Gayle frowned. Much of her original intelligence network had been destroyed since her cover had been blown, but enough remained to convince her Daybreak hadn’t scraped up any battleships to reinforce Admiral Blackthrone. The Daybreakers hadn’t even laid the groundwork for any battleships. No supply depots, no major shipyards, no fleet train … And yet, the ships had fired missiles …

She leaned back in her chair. Lafarge was in command. She had to trust him.

Alarms howled, again. “New contacts,” the sensor officer snapped. The display sparkled with red icons, far too close to the planet for comfort. “Multiple enemy contacts!”

Gayle swore. But it was far too late.

 

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Leo braced himself as Gypsy crashed back into realspace.

“Deploy drones,” he snapped, before the aftershocks had a chance to fade away. Their arrival would have been visible right across the system. The rebels would have to be blind to miss them and he knew for a fact they weren’t. “Prepare to engage!”

The display lit up a moment later, hundreds of red icons orbiting Yangtze. The analysis software went to work a moment later, isolating Admiral Blackthrone’s ships – and the rebel fleet – from the rest of the clutter. It looked as if the two fleets were engaged in a drawn-out battering match that favoured the rebels, but Leo didn’t have the time or the firepower to intervene even if he didn’t have orders of his own. The rebels automated defence platforms were rapidly switching targets, moving from protecting the high orbitals to engaging the newcomers. They’d open fire in bare seconds.

“Target the automated platforms,” Leo ordered. “Fire at will!”

“Aye, sir,” Anderson said. The fleet opened fire, spitting tiny railgun projectiles towards their targets. The automated platforms weren’t designed to manoeuvre, making them easy targets. They were normally intended to back up orbital fortresses and battlestations, not cover a world on their own. The rebels presumably intended to ship in fortresses of their own, given time, but right now they had to rely on the automated platforms. That was going to cost them. “They’re returning fire.”

Leo nodded. Free-floating missiles as well as the automated platforms … he assumed the former had been captured, despite the admiral’s best efforts. The rebels might have been wiser to use them as makeshift mines, rather than missiles, but Leo’s drones were already sweeping space for enemy minefields. They might not have dreamed up the tactic themselves, yet they’d seen it in action. They’d try to host him on his own petard if they thought they could make it work.

He smiled, then leaned forward. The rebel fleet was in a bind. If it altered course to engage Leo’s ships, Admiral Blackthrone would attack their rear; if they left him to get on with it, they’d suffer an embarrassing – if not particularly painful – defeat. Either way … he watched, coldly, as automated weapons platforms began to die. Their point defence was puny, unable to do more than delay their destruction. One by one, the platforms vanished from the display.

“Open a channel,” Leo ordered. He waited for the nod before proceeding. “Attention, industrial nodes. This is your one warning. Stand down. Deactivate your sensors and any weapons you may have fitted to your hulls. Do not allow yourselves to be used for military purposes and we will leave you intact. I say again, do not allow yourselves to be used for military purposes and we will leave you intact. There will be no further warnings.”

He glanced at Anderson. “Signal Government House,” he ordered. “The evacuatrion is to begin in five minutes.”

“Aye, sir.”

And let’s hope to hell they’re ready, Leo thought. The admiral had sent instructions to prepare, but he hadn’t given any exact timings. There had to be a rebel spy or two … dozen … amidst the staff and someone was bound to get the word out, if they figured out precisely when the relief force was coming. If they’re not on the shuttles in a few minutes, we’ll have to leave them behind.

“Message acknowledged,” Anderson reported. “They’re saying they’ll be in the air as planned.”

Leo gritted his teeth. Government House had changed over the last two years, as Governor Brighton acquired a staff and all the other trappings of power, his staff – of course – accompanied by their families. There were three thousand people on the priority evacuation list and over twenty thousand on the secondary list, all of whom would start jostling for postion as soon as they realised the evacuation was finally underway. It was going to be a nightmare. The admiral had ordered the military CO to take command and do whatever it took to ensure the evacuation went smoothly, but would it be enough? Leo feared the worst. Governor Brighton was a decent man, but not – by nature – a decisive one. Leo had no idea why he hadn’t been recalled long ago.

“Tactical, deploy long-range KEW strikes against enemy positions on the surface,” he ordered, grimly. “Don’t hit any target close to a civilian population, if possible, but anything else is fair game. Take them out.”

“Aye, sir.”

“And launch our shuttles,” Leo added, as the projectiles flew towards their targets. It was a risk, no matter what they did to avoid casualties, but he had to accept it. They dared not let a rebel force realise an evacuation was underway and move in to engage the shuttles with HVMs. It would be an atrocity if they hit even one … “Tell Sergeant-Major Boothroyd that he is to take all necessary steps to ensure the evacuation proceeds smoothly.”

“Aye, sir,” Anderson said.

He knows that already, Leo thought. The shuttles were already deploying, picking up speed as they raced towards the high orbitals. You briefed him yourself.

Sweat prickled down his face as he waited, feeling time ticking by dangerously fast. The rebel fleet seemed torn between engaging Admiral Blackthrone and turning to face Leo himself, their conduct oddly hesitant for a force that had won one battle and looked forward to winning another. Was their commander indecisive, Leo asked himself, or was he playing a deeper game? The rebels needed to keep their fleet intact, if they wanted to win the war, and that meant their CO might be stalling … or perhaps the rebels wanted the evacuation to go ahead. It would get rid of the governor and his staff without forcing the rebels to decide what to do with them. There weren’t many good options …

“Contacts,” Anderson snapped. “Ah … they just launched dozens of shuttles!”

Leo blinked. That was odd. “At us? Or the planet?”

“At us,” Anderson said. “They’ll be within engagement range in seven minutes.”

“Interesting,” Leo mused. Shuttles rarely carried anything heavier than popguns and light assault missiles, designed more to clear the landing zone of hostiles than engage starships. Daybreak had experimented with starfighters, but the concept had never really got off the drawing board; the handful of designs that had made it all the way to test models had found it impossible to evade certain technical limitations. Using shuttles as makeshift fighters … they could carry shipkiller missiles, he supposed, but only one or two apiece. “What are they doing?”

His eyes narrowed. Were they suicide runners? He hadn’t seen kamikaze tactics from the rebels before, but there were planets – perpetual thorns in Daybreak’s hide – where suicidal attacks were considered highly commendable. Leo didn’t understand the logic, but he didn’t have to understand their thinking to realise the threat. The enemy might be intending to ram his ships as well as fire missiles into their hulls. And if they’d crammed those shuttles with nuclear bombs …

“Target the shuttles with point defence, open fire as soon as possible,” he ordered. The shuttles were larger than standard missiles, and slower too, but they made up for it by having a human pilot who could put his craft through manoeuvres no missile could match. He guessed the rebels had been trying to solve the starfighter problem too. “And …”

Anderson cut him off. “Sir, the enemy fleet has opened fire on us!”

Leo blinked. “Are they mad?”

He sucked in his breath. The wave of missiles had been fired from well beyond effective range … either the rebels were desperate or … fuck. They thought they could hit him at such a range and that meant … he shoved the thought aside and forced himself to think. If the missiles really could hit his ships, then all his planning had just gone out the airlock. And the missiles were catching up with the shuttles …

“Deploy all countermeasures,” he ordered. “And engage all targets as soon as they enter point defence range.”

He leaned forward, cursing under his breath as the first shuttles rose from the surface. Deliberately or not, the enemy had thrown him one hell of a curveball. Their shuttles weren’t broadcasting IFF codes, which raised the spectre of his point defence firing on his own shuttles … and the missiles were getting closer. He could jump out – they hadn’t trapped him in realspace – but that would mean abandoning the mission and leaving the evacuees behind. It could not be tolerated.

“Order the shuttles to hold back,” he said. It was going to be a headache – they might not have time to collect more evacuees – but there was no choice. “And redeploy the patrol ships. I want them forward.”

“Aye, sir.”

Leo braced himself as the storm of death crashed into his ships. The enemy missiles weren’t just long-range, he noted as the damage started to mount and a number of ships vanished from the display. They were frighteningly accurate, slipping through waves of sensor decoys and ECM nodes that should have drawn them away from their targets to hurl themselves on the true ships … it should have been impossible and yet, the data didn’t lie. How the hell were they doing it?

“Sir, the shuttles are opening fire,” Anderson reported. “They’re launching assault missiles …”

“They’re supplying targeting information to the missiles,” Leo snapped. It made a certain kind of sense, if one was prepared to take the risk. Up close, the shuttles could easily see through the deceptions and direct the missiles onto the real targets. Clever … another use of common or garden technology that had slipped past Daybreak. “Designate the remaining shuttles as priority targets, take them out!”

“Aye, sir,” Anderson said. Another shudder ran through Gypsy. “The enemy fleet is altering course.”

Leo frowned. The enemy ships were slowly turning back to face his ships, putting a time limit on the evacuation. He tapped his console to call Boothroyd, then thought better of it. The marine was busy, and besides he would be monitoring the situation. He knew how little time the fleet had before it had to leave. Leo’s orders left him very little leeway. If the enemy was on the verge of pinning him down, he was to jump out at once regardless of how many evacuees were left behind.

Anderson sounded nervous. “What are they doing?”

“Good question.” Leo had no idea. The rebels seemed to be inching onto a ballistic trajectory, as if they intended to bring their ships around the planet and trap him against the high orbitals. An absurd idea in the old days, but now it might just work. If the admiral was unable or unwilling to intervene … “Project the range of their gravity generators on the main display.”

“Aye, sir.”

Leo frowned. There was no way the enemy fleet could get close enough to pin him without giving him plenty of time to jump out. Their CO might not expect him to abandon the evacuees, and Leo was certainly unwilling to do so if it could be avoided, but orders were orders. The admiral might consider Leo’s ships expendable, yet they were better than nothing. They were certainly more important than the evacuees. The enemy tactics made no sense.

“Deploy two new shells of recon drones around our position,” he ordered. “And unload the shuttles as fast as possible.”

He kicked himself a moment later. The order was unnecessary. His crews were moving as fast as they could, bringing in the shuttles and docking them as fast as possible, throwing safety procedures out the airlock just to make sure the shuttles could be launched back into space and sent back down to collect more before it was too late. The crew didn’t need him nagging them, not now and not ever.

Anderson glanced up. “Signal from Piper, sir,” she said. “A young girl left her puppy behind.”

Leo swallowed several nasty and sarcastic replies. The incident was unfortunate, and he knew how it felt to lose a pet, but it couldn’t be helped. He wouldn’t order the marines on the surface to waste time looking for a puppy, when they could get more evacuees onto the shuttles; there was no way in hell he’d even consider forwarding the order. If there were complaints later … he’d deal with them. The admiral would certainly understand.

“She has to be the child of someone important,” Francis said. He’d been surprisingly quiet as the fleet started its mission. Leo wasn’t sure why, but he wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. “Why …?”

“Tell Piper that we don’t have time to look for a puppy,” Leo said, cutting him off. The poor kid would have to come to terms with her pet’s death. Leo wouldn’t put anyone in danger to look for a dog. It was going to be hard enough leaving humans behind. Anyone who hadn’t reported to the evacuation points wouldn’t get a second chance. “And …”

He shook his head. “Just tell them.”

“Aye, sir.”

Leo turned his attention back to the display. The rebel fleet was behaving oddly, slipping into the admiral’s missile range for a few seconds and then slipping out again … were they trying to get him to waste his missiles on targets just outside his range, or did they have something else in mind? The admiral could alter course and dive for open space any time he liked … Leo wondered, idly, why the admiral hadn’t made a move to escape. The evacuation was well underway and his ships no longer needed to be risked …

“Signal from Sergeant Boothroyd, sir,” Anderson reported. “The last of the evacuees are being loaded now. He’s implementing Case Philly. He estimates it will be completed in two minutes.”

Leo nodded, coldly. The PDCs were being evacuated, demolition charges within their structures primed to detonate as soon as the shuttles were clear. Their defences had already been switched to automatic … hopefully, the rebels had taken enough of a beating to keep them from realising what was happening and taking advantage before it was too late. Government House wouldn’t be destroyed, but everything from the datacores to paper records had been destroyed, leaving the rebel spooks with nothing to study. Leo suspected there would be some oversights – there hadn’t been time to organise a complete search of the mansion, let alone the rest of the city – but hopefully it wouldn’t matter. All the pre-war plans had been smashed beyond repair. Anything the rebels recovered would be both genuine and actively misleading.

“Tell him to get off the surface as quickly as possible,” he ordered. Boothroyd would already be doing it, if Leo was any judge. He knew their time was about to run out. “And then we can take our leave.”

He keyed his console, bringing up an image of Yangtze. The planet had been … not exactly a home, when he’d been born on Daybreak and spent most of his time on Waterhen, but he’d grown to love her. He’d enjoyed hiking and swimming and making love under the trees … his heart clenched as he recalled just who had been with him, a rebel spy hiding in plain sight. It would be petty spite to drop KEWs on her family’s estates, wouldn’t it? They no longer belonged to her or her relatives … he wondered, suddenly, if she’d taken them back. If she was still alive … she would be. Leo was sure of it. They weren’t finished with each other yet.

“There are reports of rioting on the streets,” Anderson said. “Sir …?”

Leo gritted his teeth. The city had been abandoned now, the loyalist population abandoned to their fate. There was nothing he could do about it, no way to get the rest of the locals into space … no way, even, to threaten the rebels to make sure they treated them kindly. Some would switch sides at once, he was sure; others would try to fight, even though it was pointless. And still others … he shook his head. He was powerless to help them.

“Alter course, take us away from the planet,” Leo ordered. “Prepare to jump.”

“Aye, sir,” Maurice said.

Leo exchanged looks with Francis, then turned his gaze to the display. The last of the shuttles were rising through the atmosphere, leaving the rest of the population to its fate. They were picking up speed, readying themselves to catch up with the fleet … Leo eyed the orbital industries warily – if they were armed, they’d never have a better chance to ruin the evacuation – and didn’t relax until the shuttles were safely past. They’d land on the hulls shortly and then the fleet could jump clear, congratulating itself on a job well done. It wasn’t the bloody nose the rebels deserved, unfortunately, but it would suffice …

Alarms howled. “Sir, twelve enemy starships just jumped into postion, right in front of us!”

Leo swore. “Bring up the jumpdrives now,” he ordered, sharply. They should have a few seconds before their time ran out. The remaining shuttles would have to hurry if they didn’t want to be trapped. “Jump on my command …”

A dull shudder ran through the ship. “Sir, they just activated their gravity generators,” Anderson reported. “We’re trapped!”

Leo sucked in his breath. He’d misjudged the enemy. Either they’d brought their generators up faster than he’d thought possible or they’d had the generators powered up already. They were trapped … and alarmingly close to the rebel ships. The rebels might have misjudged their jump … no, perhaps not. Leo was trapped, Admiral Blackthrone was out of position, and … there was only one course of action left. Unless he wanted to surrender …

“Signal all ships,” he ordered. There was no way he could surrender. Not now. He had never been taught how to give up. “Prepare to attack!”

 

Chapter Thirty-Nine

“Brace yourself,” Leo said. “This is going to be tight.”

The tactical situation was brutally simple. The enemy fleet was between his squadron and open space. There was no way to fall back without being trapped and pinned against the planet by the original enemy fleet; remaining where they were, in hopes the admiral could intervene, meant being shot to pieces within minutes. The only hope of survival was to go through the new fleet and either fight their way to link up with the admiral or take out the gravity generators themselves before it was too late. And that meant closing the range at terrifying speed.

“Signal the fleet,” Leo ordered, grimly. “The gravity generators are priority targets. They have to be taken out at all costs.”

He gritted his teeth, tapping orders into his terminal. Normally, he’d order the transports to remain behind, shielding them with his warships … there was nothing normal about this engagement. He couldn’t leave them behind for fear they’d be blown away if the fleet linked up with the admiral, rather than taking out the generators. And that meant they’d draw fire … he cursed under his breath. The rebels might not target them deliberately – they could have taken out the PDCs below if they’d been willing to use weapons that would destroy the city as well – but in the confusion the odds of them being hit were terrifyingly high. Hell, the rebels might not be able to tell the difference between an armed freighter and a transport. They’d blow the ships away without having any idea of what they’d hit.

“Lock missiles on the enemy screen,” he added. “And fire as we narrow the range.”

“Aye, sir,” Anderson said.

Leo cursed under his breath. Tactical doctrine called for missiles to be fired at close range, in hopes of scoring a hit before the target could either take out the missile with point defence or escape the battlefield by jumping out. The rebels had turned that on its head, creating a situation where missiles had to be fired as quickly as possible, for fear they’d be lost along with their motherships when the enemy’s blows struck home. Leo cursed their tactical thinkers under his breath as it dawned on him the rebels could still jump out if they were losing, simply by turning off their own gravity generators. That was going to be a problem … it would change, he promised himself, once Daybreak started deploying gravity generators of its own. The enemy would be pinned down too.

He swallowed hard as he studied the display. His warships – a fancy name for outdated or converted starships – were forming up, screening the transports as best they could. Their formation looked a mess, and no doubt some armchair admiral would berate him for not lining his ships up neatly, but he didn’t care. The harder it was for the enemy to predict their location the better. And his crews … the dregs of the service and foreigners, crewmen who had come under suspicion through no fault of their own. They were about to fight, and many were about to die, for Daybreak. His eyes sought out Porcupine’s light code, holding postion near the edge of the formation. Madeleine was there, a woman who had given her life to the navy only to be shamefully betrayed. When the fighting was over, Leo promised himself, things would be different. The navy would be made to acknowledge what it owed the foreigners.

“Deploy all the decoys we have,” he ordered. There was no point in holding back now. “And signal all ships. The battleline will advance to engage the enemy.”

“Aye, sir.”

Gypsy shivered as her main drives thrust her forward, the remainder of the squadron falling in behind her. The display updated rapidly, shadowy sensor ghosts taking position too … the range was too close for them to be wholly effective, Leo was sure, but in the confusion the enemy would have trouble dismissing them completely. He tapped commands into his terminal, altering the missile targeting systems to allow for a degree of manual control. The range was narrowing so rapidly that realtime steering was actually becoming possible, an idea the rebels themselves had pioneered. Hopefully, it would make the targeting a little more effective … he cursed under his breath as the rebels opened fire, their missiles screaming towards his ships at terrifying speed. It looked as if they’d started using the tactic themselves.

“Deploy the transport shuttles on remote control,” he ordered. The craft were expendable as long as the starships escaped the combat zone. “Use them to soak up as much enemy fire as possible.”

“Aye, sir,” Anderson said. “The squadron is requesting permission to open fire.”

“Order them to hold fire,” Leo said. The commanding officers were right to be concerned. The enemy had launched so many missiles that heavy losses were inevitable. A starship that didn’t manage to launch its missiles before being blown to atoms was a starship that would take its missiles with it, rather than firing them at the enemy. “We need to close the range a little more.”

He kicked himself, mentally, for his mistake. He had two jobs – command Gypsy and direct the entire squadron – and balancing them was sheer hell. In hindsight, he should have asked Madeleine to take command of the ship while he directed the fleet and to hell with anyone who raised an eyebrow. It was no wonder the admiral was commanding his units from the CIC … he put the thought aside. It had been a mistake, but there was no time to correct it now. He’d fix it later, if they survived.

The display updated again, red icons blinking as the sensors tracked down the enemy gravity generators. It looked as if there were only five, three mounted on converted freighters and the remaining two on heavy cruisers. The spooks would be able to put some harder numbers on their capabilities now, he reflected, checking the squadron was still relaying their live feed to the picket ships. Win or lose, Daybreak would know what had happened here. He tapped commands into the system, reminding his crews that the gravity generators were priority targets. He didn’t have to destroy the enemy fleet to win, not here. He just had to get his ships out of the maelstrom before it was too late.

“Enemy missiles entering point defence range,” Anderson said, tonelessly. “Point defence engaging now.”

Leo braced himself. The enemy missiles were dying in their hundreds, as the point defence network carefully targeted and destroyed every missile they could, but a number made it through the web and slipped into terminal attack mode. A handful were drawn off by the decoys, one expending itself on a shuttle that should never have been targeted; the remainder slammed into their targets, blowing them to hell. Seven ships died outright, including two with names no one dared write down; four more fell out of formation, one drawing other missiles onto her in a desperate attempt to save the rest of the fleet. The remainder …

Let’s hope the rebels take prisoners, Leo thought. There was no way to stop long enough to pick up the lifepods. The rebels would collect them, after the fighting was over, assuming they survived that long. There was nothing to suggest the rebels made a habit of shooting lifepods for shits and giggles – they weren’t pirates – but in all the confusion it was quite likely a few lifepods would be mistaken for weapons by electronic idiots and blown away before any human was so much as consulted. If they survive, they’ll be picked up. Right?

A dull shudder ran through Gypsy. “Direct hit, deck three,” Anderson reported. “Damage control teams are on their way.”

Such as they are, Leo thought, grimly. They’d prepped as best as they could, but he’d had to leave his best engineers on Morningstar Base. Their skills made them too valuable to lose. And as the damage continues to mount ...

He leaned forward. The rebels were firing again, their missiles seeming to come faster now … it might not be an illusions, now the range was closing. Standard procedure was to at least try to evaluate the results of the first strike before launching a second, but here … his ships were too close, and getting closer, for the enemy to hold their fire. Better to lose the missiles than entire starships. Leo had no idea how many shipyards the enemy possessed – the spooks had drawn up all kinds of projections, all little more than guesswork – but they couldn’t afford to take heavy losses. Not here. Daybreak might well have the edge in a war of mass production.

“Signal the fleet,” he ordered. “Fire Pattern Delta. I say again, Fire Pattern Delta. Fire at will.”

“Aye, sir,” Anderson said.

Maurice looked up. “Which one’s Will?”

Leo had to snicker, as Gypsy launched her first salvo. The joke was older than interstellar flight and it hadn’t been very funny back then, but now … he felt his mood darken as the missiles lanced towards their targets. The enemy starships moved to shield them … later, he told himself, tactics would have to be altered to strip away flanking starships and weapons platforms before targeting the heavier units. There’d be whole new classes of ships, some designed to provide covering fire and others crammed to the gunwales with missiles … the navy would come up with its own arsenal ship, sooner or later, and put it into mass production. He wondered, suddenly, if he’d have to write the book. Perhaps being so young was an advantage, when dealing with newer weapons. He hadn’t spent decades in a navy where pinning a starship in realspace wasn’t even a theoretical possibility.

“Sir, the enemy appears to have taken down around seventy percent of our missiles,” Anderson reported. “One of the generators has been hit, but the remainder appear to be safe.”

Leo gritted his teeth. His second salvo wouldn’t be anything like as powerful. He’d flushed the hull-mounted missile pods, knowing they couldn’t be recovered or reloaded; the range was closing rapidly, but …

“Switch targeting priorities,” he ordered. It was a risk, but enemy point defence was better than he’d feared. “Direct half the missiles to take out their screening elements.”

“Aye, sir,” Anderson said. “Missiles away … now!”

Leo nodded, studying the feed from the squadron. Five more ships had died and the remainder were taking heavy damage … the enemy was firing again and again, their missiles overloading their drives as the range continued to narrow. Some died, vanishing from the display well before reaching their targets; the remainder held their course, throwing themselves into the teeth of his point defences. And when they made it through …

“Signal the fleet,” Leo ordered, grimly. The second salvo seemed to have caught the enemy by surprise. They’d known it was coming, of course, but they hadn’t realised the targeting priorities had been altered. It didn’t help that the targeted ships were between Leo’s formation and the gravity generators, making it harder to pick out the missiles aimed at the screen. It looked as if they’d killed nine flanking ships, at a cost of losing several missiles themselves. “All ships are to engage with energy weapons as soon as we enter range.”

“Aye, sir.”

Leo’s blood ran cold as the range closed still further. Cannon to right of them, cannon to left of them, cannon in front of them ...

He shoved the thought out of his mind as Gypsy opened fire, her plasma cannons, lasers and even railguns biting into enemy hulls. The target shuddered under her fire, her consorts unable to protect her because they were being targeted themselves. The rebels fired back a moment later, their energy weapons slamming into his ships … Leo cursed as two vessels vanished in sheets of boiling plasma, their destruction so swift the crews had no time to dive for the lifepods. They were dead before they knew what had hit him, or even that they were under attack. The rebel ship exploded a moment later, Gypsy shuddering as she unleashed her missiles on another target at point-blank range. The rebel ship fell out of line and exploded.

“Keep the fleet together,” Leo snapped. The enemy were adjusting their formation … he let himself hope they were depowering the gravity generators so they could jump out themselves, but it looked as if they were actually brining their fleet around. Two generators were gone now … the remainder were pulling back, their flanking units spreading out to cover their rear. Their deployment looked absurd … he shook his head. Here, it made perfect sense. “And continue closing the range!”

He cursed out loud. The battle had devolved into a mess, the kind of engagement that his instructors insisted never happened, not outside bad science-fantasy. His starships were practically serving as starfighters, firing madly as they swept through the enemy position, ducking and weaving to avoid enemy fire. The enemy were trying to coordinate their response and reorganise their formations, but it looked as if they weren’t having any luck. Leo grinned, savagely, as he saw a rebel light cruiser explode. The bastard had come too close and taken fire from no less than five of his ships at once.

“Sir,” Anderson said. “The original enemy fleet is altering course.”

Leo glanced at the display and swore. The original fleet had abandoned its game with the admiral and was heading right towards Leo’s squadron, moving to reinforce the fleet holding him in realspace. If the spooks and analysts were correct, the original enemy fleet shouldn’t be able to pin them down … not until they narrowed the range. If … it didn’t matter. The admiral wouldn’t be able to do more than harry his opponents, unless he wanted to risk closing the range himself. Leo doubted it. The admiral’s ships were the sole remaining modern military force in the sector.

“Concentrate on taking out the gravity generators,” Leo said. It was weirdly flattering to have so much tonnage heading towards his position, intent on killing him, but it was flattery he could have easily done without. If the enemy had been a little slower off the mark, he might have been able to extract his ships by now. “We need to take them out!”

The range continued to close. Gypsy hammered a cruiser several times her size and had the satisfaction of seeing her fall out of line, plasma burning from her damaged hull, before continuing the offensive. A gravity generator was exposed and targeted by a dozen different ships, their missiles reinforced by decoys and sensor jammers … only one missile made it through the enemy’s point defence network, but it was enough. The converted freighter vanished in a ball of superheated plasma.

“One left,” Anderson said.

Leo nodded, ice gripping his heart. The final gravity generator was mounted on a heavy cruiser, flanked by an ever-growing number of enemy ships … racing away as fast as they could. It was bizarre – he felt like a mouse chasing a cat – but he had to admit it was working. The enemy would try to open the range again, while waiting for the rest of their ships to close with Leo’s squadron and destroy it. His eyes narrowed as the enemy tightened their formation. Purely defensive configurations were rare in space warfare – his instructors had argued that going onto the defensive was tantamount to accepting eventual defeat, and if you did you might as well speed things up by withdrawing from the battlefield – but the pattern in front of him was a very good one. As long as they held out, Leo’s fleet would be trapped. There was just no way to alter course and escape before it was too late.

Gypsy shuddered, again. An enemy shot had found its target.

“Close the range,” Leo snarled. “All ships, fire at will.”

His ship belched her remaining missiles, the much-reduced salvo streaking towards their targets. The remainder of the squadron followed suit – Leo’s heart clenched as he realised he’d lost several ships without even noticing – and fired, their missiles tearing into the enemy position. It wasn’t enough. The flanking units were drawing closer together, keeping his missiles from striking their real target … he swallowed, hard, as the energy weapons opened fire. The enemy fleet held the line … he felt a flicker of admiration, mingled with hatred. The engagement had cost them, but they were going to win.

He forced himself to think. The rebels were picking up speed. They could keep going, fending his ships off all the while, until the other fleet caught up with them. The gamble had failed and that meant … surrender wasn’t an option. Not for him. And that meant …

“Sir,” Anderson said. The sudden alarm in her voice echoed across the bridge. “Porcupine is overloading her drives …”

Leo looked up. “What …?”

He stared in horror as Madeleine’s ship accelerated, launching her final drones as she raced towards the enemy position. The compensators would overload at any moment, if they hadn’t already, dooming her crew to instant death … he reached for the console to call her, to order her back, even though it was already too late. There was a tiny gap in the enemy formation, too fleeting for delay … he swallowed, hard, as Porcupine swept through the gap and rammed the rebel heavy cruiser, both ships vanishing in a single burst of light. She was gone …

“Sir, the gravity field has collapsed,” Anderson reported. “We’re free to jump.”

“Signal all ships,” Leo ordered. Madeleine was dead and … there was no time to mourn. They’d won, at such a cost it felt more like a defeat. “All units are to jump out as planned. I say again, all units are to jump out as planned.”

A moment later, it was all over.

 

Chapter Forty

Leo stared at the datapad, without quite seeing it.

There was no body, of course. No possessions. Madeleine’s cabin on Morningstar I had been destroyed, along with the rest of the base, and the records suggested she hadn’t transferred any personal possessions to Morningstar II. It was customary for spacers to travel light, at least until they reached command rank, but Madeleine appeared to have taken it to extremes. No personal photographs, no books or portable gaming systems, no nothing. Her will hadn’t been updated since she’d joined the navy, he noted; it stipulated merely that her possessions, such as they were, should be distributed amongst her bunkmates. There was nothing else, not even a final message for her family or a wish for her body to be returned home. It was almost as if she hadn’t existed at all.

He sat in his cabin on Gypsy, feeling a twinge of bitter guilt. He’d liked Madeleine, in a way he couldn’t quite put into words. She’d been very different from his previous lovers, a prickly person who reminded him, in a way, of himself. She had deserved better than to be betrayed by the navy, to be assigned to an asteroid base instead of the command she’d earned; she deserved better than to have died in a final desperate engagement, giving her life to save her comrades from certain death. Leo had recommended her for a posthumous Daybreak Star, the highest award the navy could offer, and Admiral Blackthrone had endorsed it. He hoped to hell she’d get it. She deserved no less.

His thoughts ran in circles. They’d gotten the evacuees out, but had it been worth the cost? Leo had lost forty-seven ships and Admiral Blackthrone had lost three, to say nothing of the damaged vessels that would be scrapped if they weren’t so desperately needed. The cost had been staggering, in ships and lives, and it was no consolation the rebels had been hurt too. He wondered, morbidly, if they thought it worthwhile. They’d failed to keep him from escaping, true, but they had secured their control over Yangtze. Gayle could finally return home. And the war was very far from over.

There was a chime at the door. “Come in!”

Flower entered, looking tired. “Are you all right?”

“No,” Leo said. Gayle and Sun had betrayed him … that had hurt, but not like this. “I just feel …”

“You were in love with her,” Flower said, flatly. “Weren’t you?”

Leo hesitated, unsure. He had liked her, true, but love? It was hard to answer. She had been very much like him in many ways, and that meant … what? He didn’t know. Perhaps she’d snuck up on him, worming her way into his heart … unintentionally. And …

“I don’t know,” he said, finally. “She deserved so much better.”

“She did,” Flower agreed. “She was a good officer, brilliant even. And the way she was treated … you wanted to help her, Leo, and you did.”

“Not enough,” Leo said. “She should have been in command. She should have been given a ship of her own. Not …”

He scowled. They’d held the ceremony for the dead when they’d reached safety, such as it was, but it had given him no closure. Madeleine had been a friend as well as a lover, for all her prickly personality … he’d trusted her. She’d trusted him … and he’d taken her to her death. She’d given her life to save his, to save everyone’s … she deserved so much better.

Flower squeezed his shoulder, lightly. “Don’t forget her,” she said. “But don’t lose yourself either.”

“Hah.” Leo looked up. “Why would I lose myself?”

“You’re young,” Flower said. “Young and idealistic. Most officers who assume command tend to be older, old enough to be a little bit more cynical about the realities of the universe … old enough to accept that some people get unfairly treated, for security reasons, even though it is unfair. You’re young enough to see the injustice and try to do something about it. And …”

She met his eyes. “And you do fall for girls who need your help,” she said. “Or girls you think you can help.”

Leo flushed. “I don’t think that’s true.”

“It looks to me as though it is,” Flower said. She sat back. “What now?”

“I have no idea,” Leo said. He had never felt so tired and drained in his life. How long had it been since his last period of shore leave, since he’d last been able to take off the uniform and just be himself? It felt like decades, centuries even. He wanted to go and yet he knew he couldn’t. All leave had been cancelled, and rightly so. “I guess we’ll be resuming our raids on occupied star systems …”

He sighed. There was to be a staff meeting in four hours … would the admiral blow a fuse if Leo didn’t attend? Probably. The navy needed to find a way to take the offensive again, holding the line until reinforcements arrived, and everyone had to take part. If he could come up with a new idea, one that would give them the edge … he shook his head. Madeleine wasn’t going to be there. How could she?

“I won’t tell you to forget her,” Flower said. “That never helps. The pain will linger for a long time, I’m sorry to say, and it will never completely fade. But she wouldn’t want you to throw away your life and your career for her.”

“Things will be different,” Leo said. “If I go into politics … things will be different.”

Flower smiled. “You could make a difference,” she agreed. “And you’re a name now.”

“Yeah,” Leo said. “I guess I am.”

The intercom bleeped. “Sir,” Anderson said. “Admiral Blackthrone is asking to speak with you.”

Asking, Leo thought. Right …

“Put him through,” he ordered.

Admiral Blackthrone’s face appeared on the terminal. “Commander,” he said. “A courier boat just arrived from Daybreak.”

Leo frowned. Whatever message was on the boat, it would be weeks out of date … at best. And if the admiral was calling him personally … it wasn’t good news.

“Sir?”

“I have been formally relieved of command and ordered to report back to Daybreak,” Admiral Blackthrone said. “Both yourself and Francis have been asked to accompany me.”

“Me, sir?” Leo blinked. He’d written a set of full reports and sent them home. There was little he could offer in person, certainly nothing worth the trouble of summoning him to Daybreak. “They want to see me?”

“I imagine they want you to testify,” Admiral Blackthrone told him. “My court martial is an inevitability, as I told you. Even if the admiralty feels I did the best I could, under the circumstances, a formal proceeding may be the only way to prove it to the rest of the republic. Regardless …”

He paused. “We’ll be leaving tomorrow morning,” he added. “Turn your command over to your XO, then report to the courier at 0900.”

Leo nodded. There was only one possible response. “Yes, sir.”

The admiral nodded, then closed the connection. Leo took a long breath.

“Going home,” he said, slowly. “What the hell do they want me for?”

“You never know,” Flower teased. “Just tell the truth and you’ll be fine.”

Leo snorted. The summons was unexpected … and ominous. He’d never heard of a junior officer being summoned in such a way and he couldn’t help feeling it boded ill for the future. And leaving his comrades to fight the war alone sat poorly with him. He had a duty to see it out.

And yet … he sucked in his breath. Madeleine had fought and died for Daybreak. Countless other foreigners, under the same cloud of unfair suspicion, had fought and died too. He owed it to their memory to take their story to his superiors, to wash away the taint of unfair suspicion, and if that meant speaking up in front of the senate itself … he would do it. It was his duty. He owed to himself and to her.

They won’t be forgotten, he promised himself, as he stood. Next time, things will be different.

END OF BOOK FOUR

LEO MORNINGSTAR WILL RETURN IN:

SHADOWED GLORY

COMING SOON!

 

Damn, but I hate to see it end. It was a good read, as were the other books, and I'm sure that the next book will be just as good!