Rebellion's Fury Page 7

  The platform had been supported by two captured federal frigates, manned with volunteer skeleton crews. With those combined weapons, the initial missile barrage had destroyed three federal ships, and severely damaged two others. It was a morale boost, but an empty one, a short-lived victory having more to do with the greater range of the platform’s fixed weapons than any real prospects of ultimate success.

  As soon as the federal fleet moved into its own firing range, its ships opened up as well, and it quickly became apparent they had no intention to board the station and attempt to retake it. As hit after hit slammed into the great structure, targeting one vital system after another, little doubt remained that the federals were going to pound the thing to dust.

  Damian was surprised. He’d thought the enemy would want to seize the platform, to use it as an orbital headquarters for their attempted reconquest. He would have seized it in their position, even at a greater cost in time and casualties. It seemed like a mistake to him, one he couldn’t quite figure out.

  The federals’ choice meant one thing, though. He had sent soldiers to the station for no reason, men and women who were there to repel boarders, who were almost certain to die now . . . unless Nerov could save some.

  The lack of the orbital station would hamper the federal operations on the ground. Damian felt pain for the people he was losing, but also a spark of excitement. His enemy was definitely making a tactical error.

  He’d issued his own orders to take full advantage of that mistake. He had directed the string of satellites around the planet be linked to the platform, so that its destruction would begin a chain reaction that would take out every eye and ear in Haven orbit. It was a desperate tactic, one that would set the planet’s development back years—even decades—after the war was over, but none of that mattered if the federals crushed the rebellion.

  “But if you can’t get up there in time,” he said to Nerov after a long pause, “you’ll just risk losing Vagabond, too. And all your people.”

  “It’s no greater risk that we asked those crews up there to take, is it?”

  Damian shook his head. He couldn’t argue with Nerov, not too aggressively, at least. He’d have gone, had he been in her shoes. Indeed, he hated the fact that his position as military commander prevented him from joining her, because every fiber of his being wanted to climb into the airlock right after her.

  But he had been chosen as the leader, and had in turn chosen to accept, and he’d just have to live with all that entailed. He could only hope she’d still be alive after her choice.

  “All right, Sasha. Go. But nothing stupid. Save anyone you can, but make sure you make it back. You’ve got to be clear before the station goes, or before the feds get close enough to target Vagabond directly.”

  “I’ve been in tight spots before, Damian. I’ll make it through this one.” It was clear with every word that she was completely ignoring most of what he had just told her. Just like he probably would. It almost made him smile.

  “Good luck, Sasha.” It was grossly inadequate, but it was also all he could think to say. He stood and watched her snap off something he guessed was supposed to be a salute. Then she climbed up the ladder into the ship.

  He stood another moment, but then he turned and hurried to the side, behind a large blast shield, clearing the area under Vagabond’s engines.

  “Good luck,” he whispered again as he ducked down, waiting for Nerov to fire her ship’s thrusters and make a mad dash to orbit. “Save our people . . .”

  “Maintain fire, all ships. And reload missile tubes. I want another spread launched as soon as possible.” Taggart’s body was rigid, his posture bolt upright as he sat in his chair and directed the actions of the fleet.

  “Yes, sir. Projected missile launch one minute. All ships maintaining laser fire.” Samuels wasn’t quite a match for the admiral in calm and poise, but he still comported himself well under fire. All the staff on Oceania’s flag bridge did.

  Semmes watched the naval officers go about their duties, seemingly immune to fear, even as ships of the fleet succumbed to the deadly fire from the platform. He’d been certain the rebels would put up at best a token resistance before trying to surrender, and then dying in their places as he denied them quarter. But the station’s weapons fired relentlessly, the deadly missiles and high-powered lasers ripping into the naval vessels, slicing through their armored hulls and causing catastrophic damage. The platform had been built to defend Alpha-2 against just this kind of attack, and it was doing exactly what it was designed to do.

  Semmes had insisted the attack proceed immediately, a direct assault. Taggart had proposed some alternatives, more elegant plans to cut down on the losses a frontal assault would inevitably entail, but Semmes had shot all of the options down, certain in his assertion that the rebels didn’t have a solid fight in them.

  He’d had doubts, thoughts in the back of his mind, recollections of the fighting the year before. But every argument his subconscious made was shot down by the arrogant assurance that drove him. The rebels were lucky before, and now he had underestimated only the hardware that had been left behind, the massive fort the rebels had stolen in a surprise attack.

  Oceania shook hard, the third hit she had taken. Any excitement he’d initially felt was completely gone, and at the moment, the main thing Semmes focused on was that he didn’t understand why Taggart had his flagship so far forward. The fleet had other ships to take the lead positions, and putting both the overall commander and the senior naval officer in danger seemed foolish. He’d almost ordered Oceania to retire to the rear of the formation, out of range of the station’s weapons, but in the end, fear of humiliation in front of his people won out over fear of the enemy. Oceania was a big ship, one of Federal America’s massive battlecruisers. It would take more than a few shots from the fortress’s lasers to pose a serious threat.

  “Admiral, I cannot emphasize how greatly time is of the essence. We need that station destroyed, and we need that done now.”

  “We are closing, General.” The disrespect in the admiral’s voice grated at Semmes, enraging him. But now wasn’t the time, so he ignored it. “As I explained previously, the fixed weapons mounted on the station outrange our mobile turrets. There is no way to directly assault the fortress without first enduring its fire. If you had allowed us to position for a multidirectional appro—”

  “I understand, Admiral. Just get on with it.”

  Oceania shook again, more gently this time, as she flushed the latest salvo from her missile launchers, and a cluster of warheads streaked out toward the station.

  “This last missile attack will likely finish them, General Semmes. We’ve seriously degraded their interdictive array, and at least a few of these warheads will get through.”

  “See that they do, Admiral.” Even Semmes thought that was a stupid thing to say, but he was so scared, he could barely think straight.

  He wanted to get to the ground as soon as possible. He didn’t much like interplanetary travel, and war in space was even worse. He wanted to throw up for at least half a dozen discernible reasons, spacesickness and stark terror being just two of them. But he struggled to control himself, to stare out from his position to the side of the bridge with an expression he hoped communicated anything but the gut-wrenching fear he felt.

  “Let’s go, Garabrant. It’s over. Vagabond’s on her way up, and she’s the only ride outta here. You miss this trip, it’s over.”

  Garabrant looked up from his station, back toward the door. Of all people, it was North standing there, his bulk leaning through the open hatch. He felt a rush of anger, an urge to pull out his pistol and shoot the murderous bastard. But he couldn’t make himself do anything, not get up and rush toward the door, not shoot North. Nothing. All he could do was stare at Claren’s body, still lying on the floor, not a meter from Garabrant, a pool of slowly congealing blood all around the ruins North had left of the man’s head.

  “Now, Garabrant,�
�� North yelled. “You don’t have a gun left hot enough to light a candle, so why throw your life away?”

  He looked around. He was the only one left in weapons control. Jorgen had been killed by a falling structural support, and Wertz had just jumped out of his chair a few minutes earlier and run without a word. But Garabrant had remained at his post, working the weapons array as long as he had a weapon left that was able to fire.

  “What the hell, Garabrant?” North said, his eyes darting from the body on the floor to the recalcitrant engineer. He sighed. “He was a fed sympathizer, you know that. He had a chance to do his duty.” North slammed his fist against the door frame. “It’s up to you, if you want to die because you’re pissed I shot a traitor. But it would be a damn shame. The rebellion needs men like you, Garabrant.” North looked across the room, his cold stare softening. “Now let’s get the hell out of here.”

  The station shook hard, another hit. The federal ships were close now, their lasers slicing through the huge structure. One entire section was already gone, the victim of a nearby nuclear detonation. Garabrant knew there was no time and yet, for some reason, North was trying to save his life. But he was frozen, unable to make himself respond. All he could see was the same image again and again—Claren’s head exploding in a spray of gore. And North standing there, pistol in his hand and no more emotion on his face than if he’d taken out the trash.

  North lunged across the room, leaping over Claren’s body. Garabrant was surprised, and he didn’t have time to react. He reached for his gun, scared now that an enraged North was going to kill him, too, but before he could do anything, the ranger’s huge fist slammed into the side of his head.

  He felt the impact and pain, yes, but more a fuzziness. He wasn’t knocked out, not quite, but he couldn’t do anything, either, not even think straight.

  Then, something else, North’s massive arm, reaching under him, pulling him out of the chair. He was afraid, confused, but then his eyes focused on the floor as he moved across the room and out into the corridor. North wasn’t attacking him, he was carrying him, slung over his shoulder. Saving him.

  He had an urge to fight, to try to wrest his way free, but the cloudiness in his head was getting thicker, more intense. The floor wasn’t there anymore, at least not as a clear image. Just a cloudy grayness. And then he slipped into blackness.

  “Griff, stay at the controls. Hold her steady.” Sasha Nerov leapt out of her seat and rushed through the small hatch that led toward Vagabond’s cargo hold.

  “I’ll try, Captain, but you know as well as I do, we’re out of time. If we don’t get out of here in the next minute or two, we never will.”

  Sasha heard her first officer’s words, and she knew they were nothing save for the hard truth. But there were still survivors on the station, and any who didn’t get on board her ship were going to die.

  “Do your best, Griff.” A short pause, just a second or so. “You handle her as well as I do . . . that’s the dirty little secret I’ve never told you.” She nodded to her longtime comrade and ducked into the corridor, racing toward the hold.

  She knew encouraging words weren’t going to get the job done, not now, but it couldn’t hurt. Still, the problem wasn’t flying Vagabond—it was staying docked to a station that was falling apart. The docking port attached to her ship was swinging back and forth, its connection to the orbital platform tenuous at best. There were gaping holes in the fortress’s hull and severed structural members dangling by tattered connections or floating freely in space, deadly obstacles, any one of which could slam into Vagabond with devastating effect.

  The ship shook, whipsawed again as a whole section of the station twisted, snapping the great girders that had supported it. Without the near weightlessness of its orbital position, the giant structure would have collapsed completely by now. But even the slight gravitational pull from the planet, combined with the kinetic energy from various parts of the station blown out of place and slamming into other sections, was enough to tear the whole thing slowly to shreds.

  She raced into the inner hold, her head snapping back and forth, noting the nearly two dozen men and women who’d already been rescued. They were crammed together, too many people in too little space. At least five or six were badly wounded, and her eyes rested for an instant on one who looked dead.

  She reached up and snapped down her helmet’s visor, activating her survival suit as she slipped into the airlock between the inner and outer hulls. The readout was clear about the conditions in the room beyond. Vacuum.

  Some of the escapees had made it to Vagabond before the entire section of the station lost atmospheric integrity, but now, everyone on the station without working survival gear was dead.

  She heard the whooshing sound as the small chamber vacated the air, and the outer door opened. She stared out at a nightmare.

  Most of her crew was there, wearing their own survival suits, and trying to help the fleeing members of the station’s complement. There were bodies everywhere, floating around the bay, and drifting out into space itself. The docking portal was gone, completely, a good three meters of open space yawning between Vagabond and the station. Her people had opened the rear cargo doors, and they were waving for the cluster of men and women still on the station to leap across the growing gulf.

  She moved cautiously toward the rear of the hold and added her own gestures to those of the crew. “C’mon,” she said, under her breath to herself. It’s your only chance . . .

  She knew Vagabond couldn’t stay where it was. Griff was performing a minor miracle holding the ship as steadily as he was, but it wouldn’t last. And neither would the station. In a matter of moments, seconds perhaps, the platform to which Vagabond was so tenuously clinging wouldn’t be there anymore, at least nothing of it save floating debris.

  And if Vagabond isn’t out of here by then, we’ll be debris, too.

  She looked out on the utter chaos. The station crew were soldiers, technically at least, but they weren’t professionals. She tried to imagine the fear they were feeling, and she wondered how many that panic would kill who might otherwise have survived. She had her own memories, dark ones that reached back even before her smuggling days.

  Too many.

  That’s what the butcher bill was going to be for this little operation.

  She reached out and grabbed hold of one of the handrails, and she worked her way back, toward the gaping maw of Vagabond’s open hatch. She held tightly, but she didn’t have a safety line attached. She’d have excoriated one of her people for doing the same thing. Leadership had its own form of well-meaning hypocrisy.

  She flipped on the comm line, but it connected her only to the Vagabond crew members in the hold. Her ship had been tied into the station’s main channel, yet communications were down all across the dying platform now. Which meant, in the soundless vacuum of Vagabond’s hold, the most effective way to communicate with the terrified people she was trying to rescue was by waving her arms, just as her crew had been doing.

  “Cap, this is Griff. We’ve got to blast. Now.”

  “Not yet, Griff.” Her eyes darted to the three or four figures floating through space toward the hold . . . and the twenty or more still clinging to the wreckage of the docking portal. “We’ve got more people here.”

  “Sasha, we don’t have time. The station’s coming apart. I’ve got internal explosions on the scanners, and we’ve got federal ships coming around. We’ll be in their firing arcs in less than a minute.” A pause, a second, perhaps two before Daniels continued, his voice tenser, darker. “If we wait, we’re going to lose them anyway, and we’re all going to die, too.”

  Sasha felt Daniels’s words like a hard punch to the gut. She couldn’t imagine leaving those people behind, pulling away and abandoning them to die. She tended to think she could push things further than most people thought was possible, but she’d never put Daniels in that group. Her first officer was as coldly realistic as she was. If he said they
had less than a minute, she knew damned well there wasn’t a second more to spare.

  She waved her arms wildly. “Jump!” she screamed inside her helmet, aware it was a useless gesture even as she continued. “Now! Jump!”

  Another crew member stepped off the twisted metal at the edge of the station, toward Vagabond. Sasha watched the figure moving slowly toward her, cursing under her breath as she did, aching to scream to the figures clinging to the shattered docking tube to push off hard. A rough landing was the least of their concerns now. A broken bone would heal. She was ignoring Daniels’s warning herself, but there were really only seconds left and she couldn’t continue to disregard what he’d told her. She had to give the order, and she had to do it now.

  “We’ve got to get out of here,” she said softly on the ship’s channel. “Get ready to close the hatch. Griff, as soon as we’re secure, get us out of here.”

  “Now, Captain . . . not another second.” The edge in Daniels’s voice was real. She’d heard her second-in-command when they were running from federal cutters and hiding in dust clouds, praying for enough cover to evade the scanners of the ships hunting Vagabond. But she’d never heard him as tense as he sounded now.

  She saw the figure that she’d watched push off. Whoever it was had aimed poorly and hit hard on the edge of the hatch. Two of her people reached out and pulled the fortunate crew member inside. But Sasha knew that was the last person they could save. She had a dozen of her own crew, and almost forty Havenites aboard. It would be a miracle if she and Griff could get her overloaded ship down at all, but if she waited another ten seconds, they’d never get that chance.

  “Captain, we have two federal frigates firing at us.”

  That was it. There was no more time.

  “Close the hatch,” she said, her voice like ice.

  “Captain . . .”

  “Close it. Now!” She stared out at the two figures floating through space toward the large opening that was even now closing. She tried to imagine the stark terror as they saw their salvation slamming shut, and then, seconds later, she heard the sickening thuds as they hit the closed doors. They would have slipped off, she knew, and they were now floating in space, their meager life support dwindling with each passing second.