The Starwolves (5 page)

"Valthyrra, are those packs out yet?" he demanded.

"Just leaving," her reply came.

"There is another fleet closing in."

"So I see," Valthyrra agreed. "Three battleships and twelve
destroyers. And forty stingships."

Velmeran cut his com link and swore every oath he had ever heard, including
the really good ones he had learned from his mother. But the matter was decided
for him; he reversed course, and the two fighters joined him.

"Keth, there is a drone on your ship," Velmeran called back while
he could. "We will come to get you."

"Do not worry about me," the older pilot replied. "They want
me alive, so I am in no danger. You just keep those kids out of trouble. Tell
the Commander that I'm sorry."

Their com link faded as the carrier moved out of range, screaming out of the
system at her best speed. The tiny drone followed it at a discreet distance,
silent and unobserved.

The odds were worse than ever, just three fighters against fifteen warships
and two score stingships. Velmeran had no idea who the third member of his
group was; he hoped that it was one of Baressa's pilots and not his own. He had
to overtake that second fleet and stop it short; if it caught up with the first
group, his students, now tired and quickly reaching the limits of their
endurance, would be outnumbered and vulnerable. There were enough stingships
with this second group to be effective, especially against pilots who might be
growing inattentive and careless.

"Valthyrra Methryn, do you have packs out yet?" he asked a final
time.

"Two packs just moved into starflight and can reenforce your
pilots in perhaps two minutes," Valthyrra responded. "Another
two packs can be there within another minute."

"Listen. I am going to try to get this second group of warships out of
starflight before they join the first," Velmeran explained quickly.
"We will have a greater advantage if we can keep them apart. Send
these two packs to reenforce me. Send the next two to relieve the packs already
in battle."

"Anything you say," she agreed. "Meran, that first group is
driving directly at me."

"Do you prefer to reenforce the pilots there and stop it?"

"No, I can fend for myself if anything comes through. I need the
practice. Barman. Shayrn. Take your packs and reenforce Velmeran's
position."

"We are on it," Barman agreed.

On board the Methryn, Valthyrra moved the standby alert up to full battle
alert. Crewmembers looked up apprehensively from their stations or paused
in her corridors, awaiting orders. The Methryn had not gone into battle in many
long years, for most not even in their lifetimes. They had played out this
alert in test runs so often that the reality was something of a shock. But the
ship was to be protected at any cost and no one dared to cross a Starwolf
carrier. And yet for some, those who tended the machines or sorted supplies or
taught the young, it was the first time in many years that they had felt like
real Starwolves.

"All crewmembers stand by," Valthyrra announced through her maze
of corridors and many decks. "This is a class one battle alert. All
on-duty personnel to their posts. All damage control parties stand by. All
nonactive personnel will remove to the inner sections."

"That second fleet just left starflight to fight," Velmeran
reported. "We need reenforcements. Baressa and I are up to our... necks in
stingships."

"You can have two packs in two minutes," she assured him.
"Can you hold on?"

"Do we have any choice?"

"No," Valthyrra said. "We will have matters well in hand
shortly."

Velmeran paid her excuses little mind. He was getting tired of excuses, and
at the moment he was too busy to care. He had not exaggerated; three fighters
among all those stingships were simply too few targets for too many guns.
Stingship cannons were powerful but slow to fix on target. By keeping close in,
they were not allowed the time they needed to get off a good shot. Indeed, the
stingships had to be careful to avoid shooting or even ramming each other.

The two packs had been left to their own designs for several minutes now,
and they were finally bringing their own part to an end. Of the original fleet
there remained only a battleship and two destroyers as well as several tenders
and transports, themselves no threat but a considerable nuisance. The Methryn
was still closing, now so close that her viewscreens were picking up cannon
flashes. The battleship suddenly cut from the main group, driving directly
at the Methryn, while the rest continued at a right angle to her approach.

"Go clear up whatever might be left," Valthyrra told the pilots
when she saw them circle back to give chase. "I will take care of this
one."

Mayelna glanced up from her screens. "Do you know what you are
doing?"

"I should certainly hope so!" the ship replied indignantly as
she swung her boom around to the helm and weapons stations on the middle
bridge. "Cargin, I will operate the cannons. Consherra, stand by with your
hands on the manual controls in the event something happens." She glanced
around. "Do I know what I am doing? Do you think me a tottering
wreck?"

"You are getting a little old," Mayelna commented as she sat back
to watch, seemingly disinterested.

"Old?" Valthyrra asked incredulously. "Now I feel obliged, just
to prove that I am still a very alert and capable fighting ship. Indeed!"

"Then shut up and do it."

Valthyrra quickly launched the two packs that stood ready in her bays and
immediately brought in her carrier arms to remove the empty racks to make way for
another pack. At the same time she prepared a single cannon for only one shot.

"Watch your controls. Consherra, stand ready," she warned, and
glanced up at her main screens. "Ramming speed!"

Mayelna rolled her eyes and sighed heavily.

The Methryn fired one bolt directly into the nose of the approaching
warship. In spite of the distance that remained between them, it caught
the battleship dead center on her bridge, slightly below where her own
viewscreens would have been. Content, Valthyrra cut speed and waited. Nothing
seemed to happen at first. But with her main computer destroyed, the
various systems aboard the smaller ship began to shut down, leaving her to
drift helplessly. The crew might have restarted her easily enough, but they had
already learned the futility in that. They began to evacuate her in
launches and transports, leaving the ship itself like a token of appeasement to
their conquerors.

"Simple, but effective," Valthyrra remarked smugly as the first
launch cleared its bay.

"Why, you greedy old fool!" Mayelna exclaimed. "You want to
capture as many of those ships as you can so that you can sell them back at a
profit."

"Not me!" Valthyrra insisted, rotating her cameras around.
"First you question my abilities, and then my motives. Actually, I
want those ships so that I can sell them to non-Union colonies."

"Valthyrra?" Velmeran called in suddenly. "Those two packs
have arrived and have matters well in hand. Baressa and I are on our way back
to our own packs."

"Very good," Valthyrra acknowledged. "Two more packs will
join you about as soon as you can get there. The rest will close up matters
with that second fleet."

"Fair enough."

"You close up things out there," Valthyrra added quickly, ignoring
Mayehia's look of protest. "But go ahead and get your pack out of the
fight as soon as possible. You have done more than you should already."

"No problem."

"And why did you do that?" the Commander demanded as
Valthyrra extended her camera well back into the upper bridge for privacy.

"Velmeran has had things well under control from the first; he should
be allowed to finish," she said firmly. "Besides, he is going to
want answers to a great many questions the moment he comes on board. And
the fact is that I do not have all the answers myself. The battle is nearly
over, but the trouble has just started."

Velmeran and Baressa were the first to lead their packs in, even though it
was some time after the fighting stopped before they found the opportunity to
do so. Chance had cast Velmeran in the role of leader, which everyone but he
seemed to recognize and yet no one questioned. Although the Commander had
remained silent, Valthyrra was deferring to his judgment. No one dared to
question the situation. The other pilots had been late when they were needed, and
had failed in their duty. They were in no position to protest.

The end of the battle saw the beginning of a process that was longer, more
complicated and potentially as dangerous. Every usable part of the two
wrecked fleets had to be collected, secured and brought in. Damaged ships were
drifting over an area from the fourth to the seventh planet of the system, and
to complicate matters, the survivors of the Union fleets were still in the
early stages of what promised to be a very slow retreat. Hundreds of
launches, escape modules and a fair number of tenders were heading back to base
as best they could. Predictably, nothing moved out of the station to assist
them.

The Starwolves had fared well enough for what had proven to be a major
battle. Aside from their one captured fighter and pilot, they had no damage and
no injuries – except for their wounded pride. Having been taught a
harsh lesson, they carefully scanned each ship, fragment of ship and piece of
machinery before it was brought back to the Methryn. Disabled but intact ships
were the largest item, more than the Methryn could possibly carry away. A cartier,
four of the six battleships and nine destroyers – as well as the
freighter – were in good enough condition to be saved as they were,
refitted with spare drives and other parts from ships that had not survived.

Even so, the task of salvage would not take long. Usable ships were
identified and carried out of the way. Drives and generators were simply cut
free of the wrecks and welded together in stacks for storage in the smaller
bays (the ships themselves went last into the Methryn's two main bays). A final
concern was the fair number of captives, nearly a thousand in all, who
were found trapped or stranded in disabled ships. Every drifting stingship had
a crew of five who had no means of escape. The Starwolves ordinarily collected
ransom of stray crewmembers, but this was simply too much and the Methryn was
in a hurry. The captives were loaded into three stripped destroyers and given a
firm push in-system by the capture ships.

Velmeran could see the captured freighter being edged into the right holding
bay as he began his approach. She was even larger than the battleships, and yet
she looked insignificant againt the Methryn's vast, sleek shape. Nearly four
hours had passed since he had led his pack out of the bay, although most of
that time had been spent just drifting through the wreckage, alert for trouble.
But that was still too long in the fighters. His pilots needed to go home. But
there would be no rest for him, not until he did whatever was needed to free
his missing packmember.

"Welcome back, Pack Leader Velmeran," Valthyrra said with odd
formality as he began his final approach. "Please allow me to extend both
my appreciation and gratitude for the skill and efficiency that you and
your pilots have demonstrated. I can imagine how tired you must be, but I might
suggest that you had better be alert for the difficulties ahead."

Velmeran did indeed sit up straight. Valthyrra's warnings did not come
much plainer than that. "Oh? Does one of my difficulties have a
name?"

"Yes, and she would throw my circuit breakers if she were to hear me
mention it aloud."

"My regards to the Commander."

"You guessed it!"

Velmeran turned a final time and moved in beneath the Methryn's tail, just
beneath her star drives, braking gently with his forward engines to match speed
with the larger ship. The packs came in according to how they flew in
formation; the leader first, always in the middle, then the others moving
alternately outward one step down the wing. He brought his ship through the
wide, low slot of the bay door, blinking in the sudden light of the bay,
bringing his fighter to the forward portion of the flight deck before gently
setting down. Bay personnel rushed forward before he could get the engines and
generator completely shut down.

Fighters were generally put into their racks immediately, for any
unsecured fighter could be thrown across the bay like a projectile if the ship
made a sudden turn. The rack was dropped down and slid into place behind, and
the carrier arms lifted the fighter up and set it into place. Benthoran pushed
the boarding ramp into place and climbed up to assist Velmeran, who had managed
to do little except open his cockpit and pull off his helmet. The crew chief
began unstrapping him, while another crewmember went to work on the other
side.

"Welcome back, Captain," Benthoran said. "All well?"

"Nearly. We lost Keth," Velmeran said, then noticed the startled
looks from both. "We misplaced him. He rammed a carrier and got stuck
inside her, and she escaped out of system."

"Old fool!" Benthoran muttered as he snapped down the overhead
supports.

Velmeran did not answer as he lifted himself out of the cockpit. He stood
for a moment holding the frame of the rack for support, wishing that he had as
many legs as arms, and paused, noticing for the first time the figure in white
armor waiting in front of his fighter. He straightened and descended the steps
with all the grace he could muster, hoping he would not fall. He was saved from
embarrassment by Steena, whose arrival gave him an excuse to stand and
watch.

"Play no games with me, Pack Leader Velmeran," Consherra said as
she came to assist him.

"And what are you doing here?" he asked. "Am I in that much
trouble?"