Into the Black: Odyssey One (45 page)

Things were going as well as could be expected, he supposed, given that most of the refugees were still, at least somewhat under the effects of the sedatives the doctor had administered and weren’t exactly in the most lucid state of mind, at the moment.

The pilots of the ‘Orbiters’ had pitched in and seemed to be trained medical personnel as well as pilots, which made things a lot easier.

Their efficiency almost made Weston sorry for ripping a strip off each of them in turn for their landing.

Almost.

*****

“Commander! Enemy Status changed!”

Roberts turned and approached Waters calmly, “what happened, Ensign?”

“They accelerated once they rendezvoused with the sixth ship, Sir. New ETA is still being calculated, but it’ll be less than eight hours.”

“All right. I’ll inform the Captain. Are all our people back, yet?” Roberts asked as he turned around.

“Yes Sir,” Lamont replied crisply. “The last SAR flight just came back in. All we have left out there are dirt-side, Sir.”

Roberts nodded and shrugged slightly, “Major Brinks and his team are going to be on their own shortly.”

“Yes Sir.”

“Lamont, contact the Captain. Inform him of the new ETA.”

“Aye-Aye Sir.”

*****

Chief Corrin smiled under her hard suit helmet, knowing that no one could see her. The work on the flight deck had been superb and she was proud of the damage control team that had guided and done most of the work.

Not that she was going to tell them that.

“Not bad,” she growled over the comm channels. “Not half bad, at all.”

The figures around her in the suits relaxed noticeably.

Well, she wouldn’t tell them in so many words.

Good crews knew without being told. That was what made them good crews.

“Awright,” she snapped her tone subtly different.

The men and women snapped back to attention, each of them focusing on her.

“We’re going to war, ladies,” she growled. “That means that damage control just got bumped up to the front lines on this here tub. You’re all off shift starting now, but by God you better be ready when I call.”

A chorus of acknowledgments came from the fatigued group. Corrin just waved a half salute to them and dismissed them without a word. They quickly made for the personal locks and she knew they’d be riding them up to the crew berths, in short order.

The Chief looked over the repair job one last time, noting the smooth bead on the laser weld and nodded inside her suit.

“Not half bad at all.”

*****

“Sir!” Lieutenant Amherst saluted as his feet clanged together on the deck. “You asked for me, Sir?”

“I understand that you refused to allow my message to reach Stephanus.”

“Sir, I decided that the Commander needed the rest, Sir.”

Weston suppressed both the urge to smirk at the format of the response and the desire to club Amherst in the back of his head. “I see.”

Amherst didn’t respond.

“Well in that case, Lieutenant,” Weston smiled thinly. “I believe that you have some decisions to make.”

“Me Sir?”

“You are the XO of the Flight group, are you not?”

“Yes sir but…,” Amherst paled slightly.

“Well, then you make the decisions and Steph will rubber stamp them, when you decide he’s had enough sleepy time,” Weston said with just a hint of sarcasm to his voice.

“Uh… Yes Sir.”

“Good. First, what’s the status of the flight?”

“We’re down by four pilots and planes, Sir. Two losses, not counting Flare, and Brute is in the Medical Lab.”

Eric nodded, “We’ll need you to be at your best, in a few hours…”

“Sir, the Archangels are always ready.”

“I remember that, Lieutenant,” Weston replied mildly. “But you’re badly weakened and despite the downtime, you’re going to be tired, too.”

“Sir… Captain, we won’t let you down.”

“I’m sure you won’t, Lieutenant,” Weston told him. “But I was thinking about giving you at least one more pilot.”

“Sir?” Amherst frowned, “I’m afraid I don’t see how that’s possible. We’re missing four planes, and we don’t have any replacements…, even if we did have another pilot.”

“We have at least one more pilot on the Odyssey, Lieutenant.” Weston replied, his voice a little brittle.

Amherst paled, “Captain, with all due respect, you can’t mean yourself!”

Weston permitted himself a small smile, letting the moment stretch out while the pilot paled even more. “No, Lieutenant. I wasn’t referring to myself.”

Amherst let out a breath.

“You don’t need to sound
quite
so relieved, Lieutenant,” Eric told him mildly.

“Sir, you know it’s not that. But you’re needed here,” Amherst told him steadily.

Eric just nodded, “Well, be that as it may, what’s your opinion on Jennifer Samuels?”

“Jenny Sir? She’s good people,” Amherst replied. “Tried out for the ‘Angels, didn’t make the cut.”

“She made the cut, Lieutenant,” Weston corrected him.

“Pardon?” Amherst blinked.

“Samuels flight scores were well above minimum standards,” Weston told him.

“Begging the Captain’s pardon, Sir, but why the hell isn’t she in the Flight??” Amherst blinked owlishly.

Weston heard the incredulity in the man’s voice and didn’t blame him. Finding qualified pilots for the limited neural interface system on the Archangel Fighter Craft wasn’t easy. During the war, the main limitation wasn’t in how many of them they could build, but rather how many of them they could man.

“The war was over before she could be accepted, Lieutenant,” Eric Weston replied. “We Archangels aren’t that much of an asset in peacetime, you see.”

Amherst winced.

“However,” Eric said with a thin smile. “I don’t believe that I see any ‘peace time’ in our immediate area. Do you, Lieutenant?”

“Umm… No Sir.” Amherst returned, still frowning. “But we’re still down by a plane.”

“Are we, Lieutenant?” Eric asked, gazing across the deck.

Amherst followed his Captain’s gaze nodding slowly as his eyes settled on Archangel One, the Captain’s own.

“Inform the Lieutenant of her ‘promotion’,” Weston replied.

“Aye-Aye Sir.”

Chapter 30

Savoy watched the display trailed off, and then blinked away the information.

“Burke!”

“Sir!”

“We’re cleared for a four point detonation,” he told the explosives expert. “You have the blast map for me?”

“Yes Sir, I’m dropping it in your slot now.”

Savoy nodded as curtly as the over exaggerated motions of moving in a suit would allow access his memory slot on the network. Sure enough the map file was waiting for him so he tabbed it and watched as it opened in fifty percent transparency, over his HUD.

The map was thorough, as he’d expected, so Savoy just gave it a quick glance over before he tagged it with his electronic signature and approved the plan. The suit’s computer automatically attached the geological estimate provided by the Exo-Geology lab, just to cover the paperwork required to release the powerful explosives.

“Where are we coming on the evacuation?” He turned, looking for Mehn.

“Those local boys say they’ve almost got the place empty!” The other soldier replied, his voice a bit stressed.

“Are you all right?” Savoy frowned.

His HUD flickered, a video window opening up in half transparency and the sweating face of Edward Mehn appeared.

“I’m fine, El Tee,” he panted. “Just having a little trouble here.”

“Do you need backup?”

“Negative.” The soldier replied, half tired and half irritated. “I’m almost done. There was some structural damage when the ship impacted. I’m just holding up a wall, while some kids get out.”

“All right,” Savoy shook his head. “Report back when the area is clear.”

“Yes Sir.”

*****

Commander Steven ‘Stephanus’ Michaels groaned and stretched as he stepped out of his berth and looked around.

“What?” He asked, frowning in confusion as the Archangel flight was there, staring at him.

“You tell him, Amherst. I didn’t have anything to do with it,” One of them said.

“Oh, this is gonna be good,” Steph smirked, eyes settling on Lt. Amherst.

“Well, you see, Sir. It’s like this.”

Stephanus knew that it was going to be one of those days when Amherst called him ‘Sir’. Informality was the formality of the Archangels, so when his XO retreated to proper military decorum, he’d done something he was half expecting to get spanked for.

*****

Lieutenant Jennifer Samuels lowered herself into the cockpit of the fighter almost reverently. She knew it’s every control forward and backward, her hands sliding over each in turn, lightly fingering the firing studs and arming switches with a delicate hand.

She had a hard time believing that she was sitting in a fighter, let along this particular one.

Archangel One.

The Captain’s Own.

She settled her feet onto the form molded pedals, just letting them rest there without pressure and sat back in the bolster seat that was just a touch too big for comfort.

That would be fixed when she suited up, she knew from experience, but it still felt unreal to be there.

She was lost in those thoughts, when the voice startled her from behind.

“Like a dream, isn’t it?”

Jennifer Samuels twisted in her seat, eyes wide with surprise. “Captain! I… Sorry, Sir. I shouldn’t be…”

“Relax,” Weston half smiled. “I hear you’ve accepted the posting.”

She swallowed, “I… That is, Yes Sir. Thank you, Sir”

He nodded, face serious. “It won’t be a cakewalk, you know.”

“I know, Sir.”

“I’ve checked your records, Lieutenant,” he told her, “You’ll do just fine. Just don’t get fancy and remember to stay with your wingman. You’ll have the least experience of any of them out there, so you might have some trouble keeping up at first. Don’t let it get under your skin. If you let the little mistakes get to you, they’ll pile up into a big one.”

“Yes Sir.”

Eric smiled, kicked off the fighter and floated toward the wall. “I’ll let you two get acquainted, Lieutenant. Treat her well as she’s an old friend of mine. I’d like to have her back in one piece.”

“Aye-Aye, Sir,” Jennifer replied, throwing the departing officer a salute, as she felt her attention being drawn back to the fighter that was wrapped so tightly around her.

It was good to be home.

*****

Admiral Tanner watched the displays as the first of the Orbiters departed the Odyssey and began its downward spiral. It seemed foolish in so many ways, evacuating people from one danger, just to plant them smack in the middle of another.

If the Odyssey failed to eliminate the ships, if the Forge failed to finish the work they were so desperately trying to accomplish, if the ground forces now on Mons Systema failed to account for each and every Drasin…

If any one of those things occurred, those people would die here on the planet instead of there, in space.

It hardly seemed fair, Tanner thought. That they should survive so much on their own; live through the destruction of their own world, just to die here on someone else’s.

So this is war
, he thought grimly to himself.
Such an innocuous word for something so horrific.

Millennia of peace didn’t prepare a man for this. Tanner wasn’t a warrior, he wasn’t like his old friend. He was in charge of a mining and exploration fleet, scouring the galaxy for new worlds, new resources, and new things to see.

And now he was here, defending a world with no assets of his own and forced to rely on gifts from the Gods, to save his people.

That wasn’t the way it was supposed to work.

*****

“Captain!”

Eric paused in mid-step, glancing over his shoulder. He nodded as he saw Stephanus jogging to catch up with him.

“I need to speak with you, Captain,” the pilot said.

“Walk with me, Commander,” Eric told him, “I have to get to the Bridge. We’ve almost got the refugees of my ship and we’ve got some tricky maneuvers to plan.”

“Sir, about Lt. Samuels…,” Steph started earnestly, “You can’t be serious about assigning her to the Flight.”

“And why would that be, Commander?” Weston asked calmly as they walked.

“Sir, Jenny’s a good pilot, but she’s not been drilled with the Flight,” Commander Michaels said, “The Archangels isn’t just any fighter group…”

“I like to think that I know that, Commander.”

Stephanus flushed a little, but nodded. “I know you do, Captain, but… damn it, Sir!”

“Watch yourself Commander.” Eric snapped coming to a stop so fast that Stephen was past him before he knew it. “You’re overstepping yourself.”

“Maybe I am, Sir,” Michaels said, turning back, “But you’re asking me to take a rookie out on a hot run for her first mission. Sir, I’d rather go underpowered than to do that. If she messes up, she could take my Flight with her.”

“Perhaps,” Eric nodded, conceding the point. “But I think that you’re forgetting something.”

“Like what?”

Eric ignored the challenging tone in his friend’s voice and responded mildly, “you aren’t going a little ‘underpowered’, Steph. You’re down by four planes and pilots, that’s a full quarter of your Flight.”

Stephanus grimaced, but nodded, “I’m aware of that.”

“Are you also aware that Lieutenant Samuels passed her NICS-Exam with a point three nine variance?” Weston retorted, “Or that she trained at the ‘Angels flight camp for nine months, before the war ended? Or that she was in line for a commission with the Flight until the Congressional decision to stop ’antagonizing’ the Block by dangling our feathered butts in their face?”

Steph paled slightly as the Captain spoke without raising his voice, listening to the hard edge in the man’s voice, and finally spoke. “No, Sir, I wasn’t aware of that.”

“Then I suggest you review her file,” Eric told his friend coldly.

“Aye-Aye, Sir.”

Eric watched as Stephen walked away.