Ure Infectus (Imperium Cicernus Book 4) (23 page)

The doors to the lift opened and the Captain stepped out
onto the bridge before Jericho and Masozi did likewise. “Report,” the Captain
commanded in a crisp, carrying voice as he made his way to the command chair
near the center of the bowl-shaped room.

“The VSDF Destroyer,
Kathryn Janeway
, has cleared
Chambliss’ horizon and is moving to intercept the
355/113
, Captain
Charles,” an operator reported promptly. “The
4.669
is also well within
the
Janeway
’s zone of control, even assuming a maximum-length engagement
with the
Pi Slice
.”

“Official vessel designations only, Tactical,” Captain
Charles rebuked before calling up a series of commands on his chair’s control
interface. “Helm, I think it’s time this dragon came out of hiding: plot an
intercept course with the
Janeway
and push the secondary engines to
full.”

“Aye, Captain,” the helmsman replied eagerly, and Masozi was
vaguely aware of the deck moving beneath her feet. Still gun-shy from the
experience in the egg pod, she reached out to steady herself and her hand came
up against a nearby bulkhead. Her fleeting look at that bulkhead revealed a
small, bronze plaque which read: CSS-001
Zhuge Liang
.

“Tactical,” Captain Charles continued professionally,
“estimated time to engagement using Tier Two armaments only?”

“Tier
Two
range in…fourteen minutes,
Captain,” the Tactical officer replied.

The view screen at the fore of the bowl-shaped bridge flared
to life, and Masozi saw what appeared to be a cloud of milky, white, gas which
slowly began to dissipate until the Virgin star field was visible. The rings of
Chambliss were also prominently displayed, and she once again felt the ‘ground’
beneath her shift as the ship lurched forward.

“Get those gravity generators aligned on the double,
Engineering,” Captain Charles barked, irritation creeping into his voice.
“You’ve got thirteen minutes before we exchange fire with the enemy—fix it
before then.”

“Yes, Captain,” a woman replied from the far side of the
room.

Jericho tugged at Masozi’s elbow, and she turned to see him
gesturing to a pair of apparently unoccupied workstations with chairs—and, more
importantly, safety harnesses.

Masozi realized that everyone else on the ship was securely
fastened to their workstations, so she did as Jericho had silently suggested
and a few minutes later they were locked into the empty seats.

“The
Janeway
is adjusting her heading, Captain,” the
Tactical officer reported after a few minutes of relative silence. “She’s now
pursuing the
4.669
; new estimated time to engagement, T minus fifteen
minutes thirty seconds.”

“Thank you, Tactical,” Charles acknowledged. “Helm, adjust
course for new intercept trajectory.”

“Yes, Captain,” the helmsman said, and the ship’s view
screen shifted its view to the left about ten degrees. “New course plotted and
laid
in, sir.”

Masozi felt utterly useless as she sat there, awaiting the
inevitable engagement between the two vessels. She had no idea of the technical
specifications of either ship, but even if she knew that information she wasn’t
trained to do a single useful thing on the bridge of a warship.

She turned to Jericho and whispered, “Did you know about
this ship?”

Jericho shook his head. “We knew that some of the equipment
transfers weren’t going to the usual customers, but we also knew that if we
were supposed to know where they
were
going then we would have been
told. Most of us kept our questions to ourselves.”

“You just blindly went around following orders even when
things like warships were being built under your noses!?” she hissed, unable to
believe what she was hearing.

“We weren’t ‘blindly’ doing anything,” he replied with a
piercing look, “for all his flaws—and they were many—the Director was a fair
man. We mostly trusted in his vision, without which none of us would be here
right now.” His eyes softened for a moment and he added, “Sometimes sticking
your nose into dark places is a good idea, and other times it’s not. I’m sure
you can appreciate that.”

She took his meaning plainly enough, but focused on a word
he had just used. “You ‘mostly’ trusted his vision…which suggests that you,
yourself, had reason to doubt it?”

Jericho stiffened almost imperceptibly. “That’s right, and
it led me to learn certain things…and for a long time I wished to God I could
have just had faith in the man instead of doubting him.” He shook his head and
focused on the view screen, “But that time’s long past.”

“The
Janeway
will enter her maximum firing range in
twenty seconds,” the Tactical officer reported. “Our Tier Two armaments won’t
reach effective range for another three minutes.”

“Thank you, Tactical,” Captain Charles said before turning
to face the Engineering officer. “Have you got those gravity generators
recalibrated?”

“Yes, Captain,” the Engineer replied frantically, “I’m
running it through the final diagnostic cycle right now.” Tense seconds ticked
by until she declared, “Gravity generators are operating within combat
specifications, Captain.”

Not two seconds later, the ship was shaken by a rapid series
of impacts enough that Masozi’s head was snapped sideways hard enough to pop
several joints in her neck, had they not recently undergone the same kind of whiplash
in the egg pod.

“Shields holding, Captain,” the Tactical officer reported
promptly before another series of impacts could be felt throughout the ship.
“Forward shields are still at eighty percent, sir.”

“I want precise strikes against that destroyer’s engines,
Tactical,” Captain Charles instructed as he steepled his fingers before his
face while his eyes snapped back and forth between the multiple tactical
readouts flanking the main viewer, which was now filled with a magnified image
of what Masozi assumed was the
Kathryn Janeway
. The image on the screen
adjusted its heading until it was driving directly toward the view screen’s
pickup.

“The
Janeway
has adjusted her heading,” the Tactical
officer reported—unnecessarily, in Masozi’s opinion—before adding, “new time to
engagement: one minute twenty seconds.”

“Make up your mind, Captain,” Captain Charles muttered
before raising his voice, “bring a concentrated burst of all forward weaponry
to bear on her forward shields. I want to end this quickly.”

“Yes, sir,” the Tactical officer reported, and Masozi saw a
countdown timer appear below the view screen which ticked down from sixty three
seconds. When the timer reached zero, Masozi instinctively gripped the arms of
her chair and a salvo of bright, blue energy bolts flared against the
Janeway
’s
shields. The assault continued for nearly two seconds before the other ship’s
shields disappeared and several of the energy bolts hammered into her hull
before the barrage briefly ceased.

“She’s turning to present her flank, sir,” the Tactical
officer reported just as another salvo of energy pulses smashed into the
Janeway
’s
shields on that facing. Several indicators beside the main view screen, which
appeared to indicate power levels of the
Zhuge Liang
’s systems, were
reading as less than half full on what Masozi assumed were the ‘Tier Two’
weapon systems, whatever those were.

Captain Charles leaned forward as he obviously processed the
information arrayed before him. “Divert power from the primary engines to the
particle cannons,” he instructed. “That should buy us enough extra firepower to
take them down before they have a chance to change their priorities—again,” he
added derisively.

“Diverting power now, Captain,” the Engineer reported, and
several of the power indicators beside the main viewer began to adjust until
the primary weapons read nearly full power.

Another volley if white-hot fire erupted from the
Zhuge
Liang
as the
Kathryn Janeway
rolled to present the opposite flank’s
shields before returning with a volley of her own.

The ship juddered, but significantly less than the opening
exchange had done. Masozi’s confusion at the difference in the apparent
severity of the impacts was dispelled when the Engineer reported, “Gravity
generators are nearly finished calibrating to maximum, sir. Another thirty
seconds and they’ll be aligned within 0.02% of the specs.”

“Good work,” Captain Charles said with an approving nod.

“Their shield grid has collapsed,” the Tactical officer
reported. “She’s launching torpedoes, Captain,” she added tensely, “I’m reading
eight warheads inbound.”

“Activate point defense grid,” Charles ordered in a level
voice. “But keep our fire on the
Janeway
—let’s give her wreckage a
metallic hydrogen bath—in Chambliss’ core.”

“Yes, sir,” the Tactical officer replied as yet another wave
of blue-white fire rammed into the
Kathryn Janeway
, but this time the
impacts tore huge, gaping holes in her hull. The
Zhuge Liang
’s Tier Two
weapons grid appeared nearing exhaustion of its power supply, but with just
three percent of its power remaining it ceased its fire as the
Kathryn
Janeway
was torn apart in a shower of superheated metal amid a series of
violent explosions which deformed the superstructure beneath her armored shell.

The Tactical officer reported, “Three torpedo strikes,
Captain; shields are at thirty four percent. Point defense registers five
confirmed interceptions.” Masozi was alarmed to hear they had just sustained
more ‘damage’ that they had during the rest of the short-lived battle
combined—but she was even more alarmed that there had not been an accompanying
shudder of the ship from those impacts like there had been at the battle’s
outset. She concluded that the lack of tactile sensation must have been due to
the engineer’s efforts at optimizing the ship’s gravity generators.

The slowly-expanding cloud of intermittently-flashing debris
that had moments earlier been the VSDF Destroyer
Kathryn Janeway
began
to fall toward the gas giant. Only then
did Masozi feel her fingers unconsciously release their death grip on the arms
of her chair.

“Helm: bring us about to assume an escort position for the
335/113
and
4.669
until they reach their Phase Thresholds,” Captain Charles
ordered. “Tactical: confirm the
Janeway
is out of commission before sweeping
the area for any other targets.”

“Yes, sir,” the two bridge members replied in unison.

After several seconds the Tactical officer reported, “The
Janeway
has ejected her life pods and all power signatures are confirmed dead. No other
tactically-significant targets are within range of our sister ships, hostile or
otherwise.”

“Good,” Charles said before adding, “send a communique to
the VSDF on their secure channels. Tell them they have wounded who require
their assistance; Chambliss’ EM field might block the lifeboats’ emergency
comm. beacons and slow a viable rescue operation.”

“Yes sir,” an alien crewmember replied in a synthesized,
distinctly feminine voice. ‘She’ appeared to be some sort of a cephalopod with
a human-sized ‘head’ containing four eyes. The creature manned a circular
station that appeared to have been built specifically for her species—a species
with which Masozi was completely unfamiliar. After a few seconds, the
creature’s vocalizer said, “Transmission sent and confirmed, Captain.”

Captain Charles stood and nodded curtly. “There will be
enough bloodshed in the days to come,” he said grimly before fixing his gaze on
Jericho and then on Masozi. “Let’s get you two settled; if I understand the
mission correctly, you’ve got a lot of work ahead of you.”

Two days later, Masozi staggered out of the VR simulator and
rubbed her aching eyes. She had just spent fourteen hours in flight training
simulations—which was decidedly
not
how she had anticipated spending the
trip to…wherever it was they were going.

“You did
good
today,” Jericho said
with the barest hint of approval, “you only killed us six times—a marked
improvement over yesterday’s tally of twenty three.”

“You’re already rated for this thing,” she jerked her thumb
irritably over her shoulder toward the simulation booth. “Why do I need to
train on it as well?”

“Redundancy has a multiplicative effect in certain
situations,” he replied casually, which had been almost the precise phraseology
he had used in reply to her previous, similar, queries. “We have to be ready
for everything, so we need to stay here and train until you’re rated to operate
the
Tyson
in non-combat situations.”

“But you said that time is a factor,” she argued. “Wouldn’t
we be better served by getting down to the colony and making the Adjustment?”
The more Masozi had read the file for Governor Keno, the more she had been
convinced that the Adjustment was just as justified as—if not more so than—those
of Mayor Cantwell and the other targets Jericho had ‘Adjusted’ back on Virgin.
But she was keeping those reservations to herself—along with Director Hadden’s
advice regarding Jericho’s trustworthiness—since she didn’t want to reveal any
more of her thoughts than she needed to. Those words had replayed themselves
over and over in her mind until she feared they might burst from her lips of
their own accord.

“The Governor’s not going anywhere just yet,” Jericho said
far too calmly for her liking. “She’s surrounded by everything she’ll ever
want; she’s got no reason to leave unless a higher power summons her.”

“What
are
the news feeds saying
about the fleet’s attack?” she asked.