The Lost Stars: Imperfect Sword (19 page)

“They have been throwing out shots whenever they get a glimpse of our soldiers,” Kai said.

“I’ve seen that. But it’s apparent that we’re going to be facing a much more serious threat outside our perimeter than we anticipated. We may have to assault sooner and with fewer troops. Try probing the base’s defenses to see how much fire you draw.”

“I would caution against a premature attack,” Kai said. “We need enough troops on the ground to not only penetrate the base’s defenses but also hold their gains and expand them. We do not have those forces available yet.”

“I believe that Colonel Kai is right,” Malin said.

“Test the defenses,” Drakon repeated. “Let’s make sure that base is as strongly held as our plans assumed.” He was seriously second-guessing his own decision not to ask the warships to bombard part of the base’s defenses as well as annihilate the snake headquarters. Given the limited bombardment capability of the few Midway cruisers, it had seemed much better to ensure the total destruction of the snake complex and to capture the base intact, along with the weapons and supplies within it. But that decision could not be revisited now. If the Midway cruisers had followed the plan, they had expended all of their bombardment projectiles.

“General?” Drakon instinctively looked up as he once more heard the voice of his shuttle commander, Major Barnes, through a hiss of static and wavering jamming tones. “Sir, we’re loading up now. We’ve lost two birds, several others have hits but are still flyable. What do we do after we drop the last load?”

The plan had been for the shuttles to return to the freighters and await further developments in orbit. But that plan hadn’t anticipated having an enemy battleship bearing down on them. “How long do we have left before the battleship gets here?”

“Twelve hours. The freighter crews are acting like it’s already coming within weapons range, though. They’ll run as soon as we leave with this last wave of the assault, General. I guarantee it. There won’t be any freighters in orbit for us to link up with after the last drop.”

Drakon exhaled heavily, glaring at his helmet display. “I hate to give this order, Pancho, but after your last drops, have the shuttles scatter. Stay real low to avoid any warbirds that Haris still has operational. Tell your people to find spots to land and hide until they get word to lift and rejoin us inside the base.”

“Yes, sir. General, it’s pretty hard to hide something the size of a shuttle.”

“It’ll be easier to hide on the ground than if you’re in the air or in orbit. We’ve taken out Haris’s orbital sensors. We’ll have to hope that Haris’s warships stay focused on our warships and the freighters and don’t do orbital searches for you. Odds are the attention of Haris’s ground forces is going to stay focused on us right here.”

“All that’s true, General. Good luck.”

“Same to you. Tell all of your pilots that they did a fine job, and I’ll stand them all for drinks when this is over.”

“We’ll hold you to that, General. All of my birds are loose and starting the last drop. And . . . the freighters are scattering. Looks like they’re going to hug the curvature of the planet to hide themselves from the battleship for a little while, then head off in different directions.”

“Understood.” Drakon clenched one fist, wondering if his next sight of one of those freighters would be a ball of fire blossoming high overhead as the Syndicate warships closed in on them. He had no idea where Haris’s two cruisers were right now or what Kommodor Marphissa was doing with her cruisers.

“The pressure on our perimeter is increasing,” Gaiene reported. “I’ve got at least two companies of ground forces pressing on my people holding the far side of the street.”

“Pull another company out of the perimeter to reinforce your people in those buildings,” Drakon ordered. “Colonel Kai, you do the same.”

“General,” Kai began, “we’re not yet under the same strain as—” He paused, then spoke again. “They just began hitting us harder. These are not just probes of our own defenses, General.”

“No. Assume we’re facing significant forces outside our perimeter. Once the third wave lands and the shuttles clear the landing areas, I want you to pull everyone back inside this ring of buildings. We need to do it fast and clean, so no one is caught trying to cross the street.”

“Yes, sir.”

“General?” Malin called. “I’ve been monitoring our testing of the base’s defenses. I have no doubt that the base is strongly held.”

“What are we facing here, Bran? Any ideas?”

“They were waiting for us in space, and they were waiting on the ground. If they have additional ground forces on the same scale to us as that battleship is to the Midway warships, then we could be facing at least a division.”

“How could Morgan have missed that?” Drakon demanded.

“I don’t know, General. My best bet is that the additional forces arrived too late in the game for Morgan to get word to us.”

Drakon glared at his display, where enemy symbols continued to proliferate as the pressure on his outer perimeter intensified. “They must have had some pretty precise information about our plans.”

“Yes, sir. Very precise. Someone close to you, or to the president, must have provided them with good enough information for them to plan this.”

“I already discussed that with the Kommodor. We’ll deal with that issue when we get back.” He refused to say
if we get back
. “Another half hour, and we’ll have everyone down here. We need to hit that base with everything we can as soon as we can. Help get that set up.”

“Incoming!” someone shouted across the comm circuit.

More alerts pulsed on Drakon’s helmet display, warning of a barrage of long-range missiles on its way. “They’re timed to hit when the shuttles are dropping the last load. Pancho, delay the drop.”

“Got it,” Major Barnes said, her breathing coming fast. “Braking hard. We can’t delay too much at the rate we’re coming down. We’ll reach the landing zones on the heels of the missiles and hopefully miss any shrapnel.”

“Ladies and Gentlemen,” Colonel Gaiene called over his brigade’s comm circuit. “Get your butts under cover or kiss them good-bye.” He switched to speak only to Drakon. “This could be a little ugly if some of those missiles hit the buildings we’re in.”

“I know.”

“The enemy forces engaging me are pulling back,” Kai reported.

“Smart of them,” Gaiene said.

“Yeah,” Drakon agreed. “They don’t want to get hit by their own missile bombardment.” He frowned as one of the missile tracks vanished from his display. “What—?” Another disappeared. “The warships. They’re nailing the missiles with their hell lances.”

“Too bad there are only four up there at the moment,” Gaiene said. “They got another. This might not be too bad.”

“Their hell lances can’t fire continuously for long,” Malin cautioned. “They’ll overheat.”

A detection hovered at the edge of Drakon’s sensor picture. He stared in disbelief. “One of those HuKs is coming really low. He’s getting into real atmosphere.”

A half dozen more missiles vanished, but more warnings sprang to life as other missiles and surviving warbirds bolted upward after the Hunter-Killer that had come perilously low to support the ground forces.

“Get clear!” Drakon shouted at the Hunter-Killer, wondering if they would pick up his message through the jamming.

Whether the crew of the Hunter-Killer heard or not, the warship pivoted on end and shot back toward space, tracing a fiery path through atmosphere as its tortured hull overheated. The pursuing missiles and warbirds dropped back, unable to match the velocity of a spacecraft’s main propulsion.

“She took some damage doing that,” Kai remarked in an admiring voice. “And she attracted a lot of the defenders’ attention by coming down that low.”

“We owe her and her crew,” Drakon agreed.

The blare of the
incoming barrage imminent
alarms in their battle armor caused them all to hit the floor wherever they were and wait for the few remaining seconds before the surviving missiles released multiple warheads that began slamming into the street outside. Drakon felt the floor of the building he was in flexing wildly, but, fortunately, earthquake proofing also helped structures survive the effects of nearby large explosions. Any windows still intact shattered as designed into clear gravel that fell like hail through the buildings. The street outside was obscured from view as the missile warheads filled the air with smoke and debris. As the thunder of detonations eased, he heard shattered walls of other buildings collapsing. Somewhere nearby, a fire alarm stuttered forlornly amid the wreckage.

“Coming in!” Major Barnes cried as the shuttles dropped, chasing the falling debris back to the ground. “We have no interest in staying any longer than necessary!”

The shuttles landed all around the perimeter, many making last-minute lurches to avoid new craters in the street as they dropped the last few meters. Once more, soldiers came out the ramps and scattered into the buildings, but this time as the shuttles lifted they bent into tight arcs that kept them low as they raced away across the city, dodging ground fire as they went.

Yells resounded in the street near Drakon. He glanced out the blown-out window nearest to him and caught a glimpse of a crippled shuttle cartwheeling across the sky, trailing smoke and fire. The shuttle clipped the top of a building, spun wildly, then crashed into another building farther on. Drakon couldn’t see it as the shuttle exploded, throwing pieces of itself and the building in all directions, but his armor’s sensors dutifully reported the burst of heat, pressure, and debris that marked the death of the shuttle’s flight crew.

He made another check of all comms and sensors for information on the situation above the atmosphere. But with the defender’s jammers still active, Drakon’s surviving shuttles racing away at very low altitude seeking hiding places, and the freighters running for their lives, there was no longer any means of relaying data about events in space.

“All right, you apes,” Drakon called over his command circuit to every one of his soldiers on the ground, all of whom either knew or suspected that this assault was not going as well as planned. “Stand by for assault on the Syndicate base in five minutes.”

“Hey—!” An exclamation was cut off as a lieutenant died.

The soldiers defending the buildings across the street had followed orders, withdrawing as soon as the last shuttles lifted. Most of them had made it across safely, but Drakon saw threat markers multiplying rapidly as the sensors on his soldiers’ battle armor reported a swiftly increasing barrage of enemy fire from the vacated buildings. “General,” Colonel Kai said, “from the volume of enemy fire, I would estimate there is at least a full brigade facing me.”

“Same here,” Colonel Gaiene reported. “General, the pressure on our outer perimeter is rising fast. They’re sending out thrusts across the street at us. If I don’t shift a lot more troops to defending against attacks from the outside, we’ll get overrun.”

“I concur,” Colonel Kai said.

“Shift troops as necessary,” Drakon said. He knew that would leave too few soldiers available for the attack. “Delay the assault on the fort until we’ve stabilized the security of our outer perimeter.”

Neither colonel asked how long the delay would be. They were both busy shifting their brigades to defend against the counterattacks, and they both knew that Drakon didn’t have any answer for how much time it would take before they could launch the postponed attack.

With the pressure on his forces from outside the perimeter, attacking the enemy base might no longer be an option. The victory they had planned for, and had thought would be fairly easy, now seemed impossible.

Drakon looked at his display, hearing the thunder of battle increase on all sides, and wondered whether surviving would be possible.

THE
freighters were heading off in all directions, doing what freighters always did, seeking individual safety, even though under most circumstances the only way to stay safe was to stay together where friendly warships could protect them.

But these weren’t normal circumstances.

The Syndicate battleship had veered slightly off the vector that would have brought its flotilla to the inhabited planet. It was now heading for one of the fleeing freighters. Battleships were slow and cumbersome for warships, which meant they were vastly faster and more agile than freighters. Freighters were designed for economy, to haul large cargos across long distances by the most efficient means. Warships were designed to catch and destroy other ships as quickly and effectively as possible. All of the inefficiencies of their design, the extra crews, the extra propulsion, the weapons, combined to produce a platform that could easily annihilate efficient spacecraft.

Kommodor Marphissa glowered at her display as if her displeasure could somehow change the laws governing acceleration and momentum and mass. “He can’t get away.”

“No,” Kapitan Diaz agreed. “The freighter’s only chance would be if we caused the Syndicate flotilla to divert its path.”

“Can we offer it bait? Do you think CEO Boucher would take bait? A cruiser with its main propulsion out?”

“Hua saw that at Midway,” Diaz pointed out. “
Manticore
was truly disabled in that fight, and we still got away from her. She’s not going to abandon destroying that freighter to chase us. She’s going to destroy that freighter, then probably veer port to hit this second one, then swing from there—”

“I can see the path,” Marphissa snapped. Only those freighters fleeing all out for the jump point for Kiribati had any chance of escaping, and even a single, small Syndicate warship waiting at Kiribati would catch them there.

Diaz looked away. “Your orders, Kommodor?”

Instead of answering him directly, Marphissa hit her comm controls. “
Sentry
,
Sentinel
,
Scout
,
Defender
, remain above the ground forces providing what support you can, but take any necessary evasive action to avoid enemy warships. Your priority—” This was so hard to say, so hard to get the words out past something in her throat that wanted to block them. “Your priority is to avoid enemy attacks. If you must abandon support positions above the ground forces to do so, then take that action.” The small Hunter-Killers would not stand a chance against Haris’s cruisers or the Syndicate flotilla, and
Scout
had already taken damage from an heroic but reckless dive into the atmosphere to support the ground forces.

“Kommodor,”
Sentry
protested. “If we abandon the ground forces—”

“If you are destroyed, you will not be able to support anyone. Do not hold your ground support positions if that will result in your destruction by enemy warships.” She wanted to spit once she had said those words. Anything to get the awful taste of them out of her mouth.

“We understand, Kommodor. We will comply.” The answer came reluctantly.
Sentry
did not sound any happier than Marphissa did, but they could not argue the ugly logic that drove the order.

“
Hawk
and
Eagle
,” Marphissa told the light cruisers, “you will be flotilla two. Your mission is to shadow and attempt to engage Haris’s light cruiser. It will probably try to hit one of the freighters that the battleship cannot reach.
Hawk
is senior ship in your flotilla.
Gryphon
and
Manticore
are now flotilla one. We will shadow Haris’s heavy cruiser and attempt to bring it to battle. Everyone, do your best. For the people, Marphissa, out.”

She ended the call and slumped in her seat, gazing despairingly at her display. This is what her brave words had come to. Nothing. All her warships could do was try to keep Haris’s two cruisers from doing damage to the freighters, while the Syndicate battleship flotilla went where it would and did what it would.

She would keep her warships here as long as possible and try to support the ground troops if possible, but Marphissa knew that her ability to influence the outcome of events at Ulindi was almost nonexistent. She felt the bitterness of defeat even as she ordered
Manticore
and
Gryphon
into another hopeless charge toward Haris’s heavy cruiser to force it to veer away.

—

PRESIDENT
Gwen Iceni stood in her office with her arms crossed, looking steadily at the man about a meter in front of her. “Colonel Rogero, you have had more than one opportunity to kill me under circumstances that could have been labeled an accident. Instead, you have used those opportunities to save me.”

Rogero frowned. “Madam President—”

“I am not done.” Iceni studied him as she spoke. “You became emotionally involved with an Alliance officer, placing your loyalty to her above your own safety, and have since her arrival here not attempted to hide your relationship. Those are not the acts of a snake.”

“I should hope not,” Rogero said.

“And, Captain Bradamont, who seems to have an exceptionally good head on her shoulders, trusts you.” Iceni raised one hand to point at him. “As does General Drakon. I am going to tell you something, Colonel, something that no Syndicate CEO in her right mind would share with someone like you. I do not entirely trust my own closest staff. I do trust you. I also trust General Drakon, though I often find him frustrating.”

Rogero gazed at her silently for almost a full minute before replying. “Thank you for your trust, Madam President. Do you believe that your safety is endangered here?”

“I’m not sure how to answer that, Colonel Rogero, but I do want you to know that you have my confidence. If for some reason we cannot communicate, I will be certain that you are acting in the best interests of myself and General Drakon. Do not hesitate to take actions you consider vital even if you cannot contact me to receive authorization from me. You understand why I had to convey these instructions face-to-face.”

“Thank you, Madam President,” Rogero said, staggered inside at the enormity of such an order. Coming from anyone trained and experienced in the Syndicate system, it represented a tremendous placement of trust in him and a repudiation of much of that training and experience. Of course Iceni had no choice but to give such orders in person. If they had come over any sort of comm link, he (and anyone else) would have assumed a transmission with such instructions had been fabricated. And if anyone had intercepted such a transmission, they would have gained very valuable information about the extent of Rogero’s freedom to act. “I will not fail you.”

“I needed you to know that I believe you when you say that,” Iceni said, waving a dismissive hand and turning to face her virtual window, where the waves came and went heedless of human concerns. Still facing away from him, she asked a question. “What do you think General Drakon’s chances are?”

“I am . . . concerned,” Rogero said. “The Syndicate is playing the sort of underhanded game it knows very well. But, I am comforted by the fact that General Drakon is the one they are trying to trap. If anyone can frustrate their trap, it is General Drakon.”

“Are you whistling past the graveyard, Colonel?” Iceni asked.

“No, Madam President. General Drakon was exiled here because the snakes suspected him of frustrating one of their operations, but also because the Syndicate did not want him dead. They wanted him available if they needed him. They knew how good he was.”

Iceni lowered her head, speaking in a quieter voice. “If they know that, then they will have planned their trap accordingly, Colonel. Return to your headquarters and prepare for the worst.”

Fifteen minutes later, Rogero glared out the window of the government VIP limo carrying him back to the ground forces headquarters complex after the personal meeting with Iceni. He was not happy. Bad enough that Honore Bradamont had been sent off as part of a desperate rescue mission. Bad enough that, with General Drakon gone, he was senior ground forces officer in the entire Midway Star System, with all the extra responsibilities that role carried with it. Bad enough that President Iceni had made no secret of her worries that General Drakon might be facing very serious trouble at Ulindi, because people trained as Syndicate CEOs did not reveal worries like that unless the worries were extremely severe.

On top of that, his instructions from President Iceni were deeply disturbing. What level of concern would force a former CEO to grant a subordinate that much discretion to act?

He sat back, wishing the vehicle could get him to ground forces headquarters faster. Built to Syndicate standards, the VIP limo had equal measures of lavish comfort and hidden protection. Many armored fighting vehicles carried less protection than the limo. But it could not fly above the traffic in the streets, which, though clearing a path for the official vehicle, took time to do so in a crowded city.

In front of and behind him, two other limos moved as escorts, all three vehicles having been insisted upon by Iceni. Given what CEO Boyens had finally admitted knowing, it was understandable why Iceni was worried about Drakon’s safety, but why was the president so worried about security here as well? The rumors among the citizenry were still a concern, and the danger of individual assassins could never be discounted, but this kind of protection for Rogero, on top of her orders, implied that Iceni either knew of or suspected a much more serious threat currently out there on the streets of this city.

Rogero suppressed his annoyance with the flamboyant security measures and his anger that Iceni might know something important about dangers here that she was not sharing, and focused instead on the situation. He was a soldier, after all. He should be analyzing this situation to determine whether this security was being used effectively, and the best way to do that was to look at it from the perspective of an attacker. If he wanted to kill someone, and that someone was in a VIP limo escorted by two security limos, how would he go about it?

“Driver,” Rogero called, hitting the intercom control.

“Yes, sir?” the reply came almost instantly. The driver was concealed from Rogero’s direct view behind thick layers of internal armor that separated the driving seat area from the VIP compartment, but Rogero could see the driver’s image on the virtual window that covered the armor and projected a forward view as if nothing lay between them.

“What route are we taking back to the headquarters complex? Display it for me.”

“Yes, sir.”

A map appeared in the air before Rogero, showing a three-dimensional image of this part of the city, the limo they were riding in clearly indicated, a path snaking from it toward the ground forces headquarters.

The city had been designed so that the roads leading toward the ground forces headquarters, like those leading to other important locations such as the former snake headquarters and President Iceni’s offices, funneled down into a few wide boulevards that could be easily secured with security checkpoints. That made a great deal of sense if you were already inside the complex and worried about what might be coming your way, but if you were outside the complex and wanting to get in, it meant there were only a few paths you could take for the last stages of the trip. Even though VIP caravans routinely varied their routes to avoid providing predictable targets, there wasn’t much variation possible as the available roads necked down before reaching the complex.

Rogero looked at the map and realized what he was really unhappy about. If someone dangerous enough to warrant limo-procession-level security was out to get him, that someone would be dangerous enough to figure out how to get him despite the protection afforded by the limo. “Driver, alter our path. I want to turn right up ahead, proceed for half a kilometer, then follow the route I will show you. Tell the escort vehicles.”

“Sir, that will take us around the complex instead of toward it. President Iceni ordered that you be taken back to your headquarters. I am not authorized—”

“I am giving you an order!
Comply!
”

Syndicate training insisted on obedience, backing up that insistence with vicious penalties for failure, but Rogero, like all Syndicate executives and CEOs, had long ago learned the problems that created when contradictory commands existed. Untrained at resolving issues for themselves, inexperienced with making their own decisions, and above all afraid to comply with the wrong order, workers often simply locked up like a machine told to both open and close a door at the same time.

The resulting delays could be fatal.

“Comply!” Rogero yelled again, as the limo went past the turn he had indicated and into the multipronged intersection leading into the nearest one of the main approaches to the ground forces headquarters complex.

The driver finally acted, jerking the limo to a halt in a vain attempt to back toward the missed turn. The security limo behind braked frantically, slewing to one side and narrowly missing the limo carrying Rogero, while the lead limo went onward several more meters before realizing that anything was happening.