Chapter Fourteen
“Commandos?” Rogero’s eyes were going back to the display as he felt a surge of adrenaline hit. His body was shifting to combat mode without any prompting. “I can’t see—”
Bradamont shook her head. “They’re in stealth-configured shuttles. The best the Alliance has got. The sensors on these freighters wouldn’t see them even if those stealth shuttles were doing loops around us.”
“Admiral Timbale—”
“Is losing control of the situation! He still has the fleet units and the Marines responding to him, but both ground forces and aerospace forces in this star system are acting on orders from the generals in command of them. For the love of our ancestors, get these freighters moving!”
Rogero pointed to the display, letting his frustration fill his voice. “We’ve still got shuttleloads of personnel to get on board. Are you saying we have to abandon them?”
“How many?” Bradamont pushed people aside until she stood at the freighter’s maneuvering controls. “Give me a minute.” Her hands started flying over the controls and the display.
“She’s setting up a maneuvering plan,” Ito said. Rogero abruptly became aware that both Garadun and Ito had followed Bradamont onto the control deck, making it very crowded indeed. “She was trying to get up here and being blocked by our workers in the passageways so we came along and told everyone to clear a path. What do you know about her? Does she know mobile forces?”
“She was a battle cruiser commander.”
“Alliance battle cruiser,” Ito murmured. “Which one?”
“Dragon.”
Bradamont looked over at him. “You can do this. Because these freighters accelerate at about the rate of glaciers going downhill on a good day, the Alliance passenger shuttles can keep up for more than half an hour. They can proceed along with us and off-load those remaining passengers before we build up enough velocity that they would have to break off. There’s not much room for error, but we can do it.”
Nonetheless, Rogero hesitated, thinking of those remaining loads of workers, of people who might find themselves watching freedom accelerate away from them when it had been almost within touching distance.
Ito pushed next to Bradamont, her eyes narrowed as she studied the display. “She’s right. I’m rusty at this, but if the shuttle performance levels she input are good, then it works.”
“We have to go now,” Bradamont insisted. “That doesn’t mean we’ll get clear. I don’t know exactly where those commando shuttles are. It might already be too late. But if we don’t start getting out of here immediately, then we have no chance of outrunning the commandos’ shuttles. And if those commandos catch us, then your soldiers on these freighters will not stand a chance.”
Running. Again. “Those commandos would not find my soldiers to be easy opponents,” Rogero said, hearing the stiffness in his voice. “They would pay.”
“I have no doubt of that, but you would still lose! There aren’t enough of you. And how many of the people you’ve just picked up would die in the cross fire? I know how hard it is to turn your back on an enemy. I know. That’s why you’re in command, because General Drakon knew you would make the hard decisions when they were the right decisions.”
Was it because Bradamont was making these arguments, or because he would have known the truth of those words regardless of who said them? Rogero nodded abruptly. “All right. Let’s do it.”
Ito hit some controls. “I’ve sent the maneuvering plan to all of the other freighters. You, you’re the executive in charge of this freighter? Implement the plan. Get us moving.”
Executive Barchi began slapping controls.
Rogero felt the freighter respond with an all-too-gentle nudge. “Lieutenant,” he ordered, “tell the Alliance shuttles that we need to start leaving now. If any of them ask why, tell them it was orders from their admiral. Tell those shuttles to keep up until they’ve dropped off the last passenger. Tell the other freighters to redouble their loading speed. Get our people on board as fast as they can move them even if we have to pile the last load in the air locks.”
Garadun was beside him, peering at the display. “Good thing these freighters were all pointed in the right direction already. It would have taken close to half an hour just to pivot them around one-eighty. Did she suggest that, too?”
“Yes,” Rogero said, realizing only now just how important that piece of advice had been.
“She knows ships. I’ll give her that,” Garadun conceded. “Funny, you said the war was over, and here we are being chased by Alliance commandos.”
“I guess they didn’t get the memo.” An old joke. How could he think of a joke right now?
“What is he doing?” Ito demanded to Bradamont, pointing to the display. “That Alliance destroyer.”
“He was coming this way already,” Rogero said. “To escort us back to the jump point for Atalia.”
“He’s accelerating,” Ito pointed out caustically.
Tension levels ramped up even higher, suspicious looks aimed at Bradamont as she studied the movement of the Alliance warship.
Bradamont suddenly began laughing, drawing shocked looks from everyone. “Bandolier is moving to foul the approach of the commando shuttles. Look, she’s not only accelerating but also bending her track a bit. Her vector is going to carry her short of us, but across the route that would have to be used by anything coming toward us from Ambaru. See that light cruiser? Coupe is doing the same though she’s coming in from farther out. The commando shuttles can avoid them, but the extra maneuvering will slow them down a little.”
“How do they know where the stealth shuttles are?” Garadun asked skeptically.
Bradamont shook her head. “I won’t give you the details of how the Alliance tracks its own stealth equipment. I wouldn’t expect you to give me details of how the Syndicate Worlds does it. But you know you can track your own gear, and so can we.”
“Those warships are buying us time?” Rogero asked.
“A little. Not much, but hopefully enough.”
He watched the data as the shuttle off-loads proceeded with now-frantic haste, and the vector data on the clumsy freighters showed them very gradually building up velocity, headed outward away from Ambaru station and toward the jump point for Atalia. But Rogero’s mind was consumed by other matters as well. “How did you learn about the commando launches?” he asked Bradamont.
“Admiral Timbale warned us.”
“I don’t understand. Are you saying the Alliance forces here are working against each other? That some of them are not obeying orders?”
Bradamont nodded heavily. “I told you that. They’re not obeying Admiral Timbale’s orders. The Alliance military is badly fractured. Force levels and funding are being chopped, and the different branches are fighting to keep as much as each of them can. The fleet and the Marines have the advantage of being firmly allied, while the ground forces and the aerospace forces distrust each other as much as they do the fleet and the Marines. Right now, in this star system, the ground forces commander and the aerospace forces commander are no longer working with the fleet commander, Admiral Timbale, even though he’s supposed to be in overall command. I don’t know what they think is happening, but they’ve been convinced to try to stop us.”
She looked at Rogero, her expression bleak. “You know what the war did to the Syndicate Worlds. Do you think the Alliance paid less of a price? We won. That didn’t replace the dead, repair the destruction, or pay the costs. The strains of the war tore apart the Syndicate Worlds. I don’t know what those strains may yet do to the Alliance, but the military is as frayed as everything else.”