A flurry of comms interrupted his thoughts. Eternity Base was now officially useless, and the last of the sterilization teams, job done, were pulling back, the protective wall of marines surrounding them following them into the landers.
As the last techs disappeared up the ramp of Nervous Nellie, Musaghi followed them into the cavernous hold. A final head count and they could go, their job done and done well.
The lander climbed out of Eternity Base at an impressively steep angle under full military power.
An impassive Digby sat unmoving, eyes fixed on the holovid, which was still locked on Eternity Base fast disappearing into the dark behind them. He’d been the last to board, kept on the lower deck well away from the rest of the Hammers, surrounded by an impressively large honor guard of marines. From the safety of Humpback Hill, he’d been watching the systematic takeover of everything he had built when a snatch team had emerged from the ground around him, carbines emphatically making the point that this was not the time for heroics. Slowly, reluctantly, Digby had raised his hands as, for the second time in his life, he had surrendered to the enemies of the Hammer of Kraa.
But this time, he had the blood of innocents on his hands, and the Feds knew it. For a moment his resolve had failed as he wondered whether he’d ever be allowed to walk free again.
As the lander thundered its way into orbit, Digby closed his eyes and put his head back, the helmet ring of the survival suit biting into his neck. He’d done what he could; he’d done his best. If that wasn’t good enough, then so be it. All he wanted was to be able to hold Jana one last time, and then the Feds could do what they liked with him. As he drifted off to sleep, he knew somehow that even if the Feds chose to treat him like a common criminal and hang him from the nearest tree, he finally had laid the ghosts of his past to rest.
Thursday, November 19, 2398, UD
DLS-387, Hell-14
387’s long wait for the start of Operation Corona came to a shattering and totally unexpected end.
“Command, this is Mother. I have a positive gravitronics intercept. Six vessels. Grav wave pattern indicates pinchspace transition imminent. Estimated drop bearing Red 30 Up 5. Initial drop vector suggests ships inbound for Hell Flotilla Base.”
Ribot’s heart turned in an instant to a block of ice. He struggled to breathe. Just as he had begun to hope that Mr. Murphy would not crash the party, the son of a bitch had arrived with a vengeance. He’d always known that it might come to this. Hell-14 was close to the primary approach axis for ships transiting from Commitment, and there had always been a chance that the two light scouts would have to do more than provide forward surveillance, precisely why they’d been on Hell-14 in the first place. But where the hell had six Hammer ships come from? Not from Commitment, that was for damn sure; otherwise he’d have been told, been given plenty of time to deploy his missiles to ambush the warships as they dropped and then get the hell out.
“Shit.” Ribot paused to think for a second. “All hands to general quarters, Maria. And depressurize as well.”
Hosani shot him a worried look as she commed the necessary orders through the ship.
Ribot commed Chen, whose anxious face gave him all the confirmation he needed.
“Bill, are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
“I suspect I am. We can’t just sit here and let the Fleet Base attack group just drop into their laps.”
“No, we can’t. We’ve gone to general quarters, so let’s get our heads together and see what we can do. We’ve got a little time before the bastards drop. Though I think it’s going to be real simple. Throw ourselves at them and pray that they can’t shoot straight.”
“I’m rather afraid that’s right. Wonder where they came from.”
“God knows. The surveillance reports from Commitment nearspace showed no ships boosting out-system for Hell, and we’ve had no reports of military traffic inbound from any of the other planetary systems.” Ribot sighed in frustration. “I suppose they’ve been in deepspace somewhere. God knows there’s plenty of it, so I guess we can’t blame fleet intelligence for not knowing. Reconvene in five. Ribot out.”
“All stations, this is the captain. We’ve gone to general quarters early because we have Hammer ships dropping at Red 30, six of them, and from the quality of the grav array intercept, they look to be dropping very close. I’ll be honest with you all. It’s going to be rough, very rough. But God willing, we’ll come through. That is all.”
“All stations, command. Ship will depressurize in five, repeat, five minutes.”
Michael and his surveillance drone team were struggling into their suits, chromaflage skins already darkening from their normal Day-Glo orange down to combat gray-black.
Michael felt like a marathon runner closing in on the finish line only to be told that he had to run another 40 kilometers. The whole business had gone on for so long that he could barely remember any life other than the waking nightmare he was in. If all had gone well-and Michael had spent hours obsessively going through the Corona time line to the point where he knew the plan down to the second-the marines would have Mom and Sam safe by now and soon Dad would know that. But just as he had begun to think about getting home, this had to happen. For the life of him he couldn’t begin to imagine how two light scouts were going to be able to hold up six Hammer ships, and for an instant a terrible icy hand clamped itself around his heart at the thought that death for him and everyone else onboard 387 might be only minutes away.
Michael pushed the fear away with a conscious effort as he settled his helmet onto the neck ring, the seal locking with its usual quiet hiss. With a final quick look at the tense faces of his team, Strezlecki’s deep brown stress-narrowed eyes staring deep into his, Michael smacked his visor down, commed the nitro-purge autoject, and started his suit checks. He consoled himself with the thought that even if they weren’t going home, they might take some of the Hammers with them.
He quickly said a little prayer for Anna, who’d be dropping in-system in Damishqui in fifteen minutes or so, and then concentrated on the job at hand.
“Command, this is Mother. Sensors confirm pinchspace drop of hostiles at 68,500 kilometers Red 30 Up 5. Six ships: one Hammer City Class heavy cruiser provisionally identified as New Dallas, two Panther Class deepspace heavy escorts, Cougar and Shark, and three heavy patrols, Gore, Arroyo, and MacFarlane.”
Anonymous behind the visor of her space suit and struggling to steady her ragged breathing, Hosani flicked Ribot a glance. Fear had soaked into every fiber of her being; her heart was pounding, and her breathing was shallow and ragged. Somehow, and she couldn’t work out why or how, she knew this was it for her. She wouldn’t be going home. She wondered how Ribot felt sending 387 and 166 and all onboard to an almost certain death, and she thanked God it was he and not she making the decisions. She wasn’t sure she could have done what he was doing.
As the last suit check came in, she forcibly turned her mind to business.
“All stations, command. Depressurizing in one minute, repeat, one minute.”
“Permission to step across, sir?” The unexpected voice of Warrant Officer Ng cut across Hosani’s thoughts.
“Yes, of course, Warrant Officer Ng. What can we do for you?”
“Word with the captain, sir.”
“Sure. Captain, sir? Warrant Officer Ng.”
Ribot nodded. Hosani was happy to have her captain doing something better than worry about the less than encouraging results of Mother’s latest quick and dirty sim. The prohibition on nukes set by Corona’s rules of engagement were reducing to zero what little chance the two light scouts had of causing the Hammers some grief.