She didn’t want to go back. She had no combat experience. She knew nothing about commanding this size ship on a routine voyage, let alone in combat. She could get them all killed without helping Serrano at all. The smart thing to do was go on, take the jump sequences as fast as possible, back to the central zones, and find an admiral with a battle group ready to go.
She had been a very green ensign, shy, afraid that everyone could see through her shiny insignia and new uniform to the fear—and she had stumbled and dropped her duffel right at the feet of a couple of senior officers waiting to enter the lift. One of them had laughed, and said, “They get younger every year.” The other had picked up her scattered datacubes, and said, “Ah—your specialty’s scan technology? Good—we’ve got an excellent Chief. You’ll like him.”
She had never forgotten that face. She had gotten in a disgraceful (so her commander said) fight with another Jig when Heris Serrano left the Fleet, defending her. And she had seen that face again, trying to talk Hearne into turning around . . . Dovir had played the tape for any doubters among the mutineers.
“We’re going back,” she said. Vesec looked startled, but didn’t argue. “I want the fastest possible transit back into Xavier. They can’t wait.” She still didn’t want to go back, any more than she’d wanted to be part of a mutiny, to have Dovir’s blood and organs splashed into her face, to have this command. But it was her ship now, and she would do what she had to.
“Prepare for battle,” she said, when they were back in jumpspace. No one argued. No one bothered her at all. She still had no idea how she was going to fight, but she would.
“They’re after Paradox,” Koutsoudas said.
“And she’s out of darts,” Heris said. “Dammit, Tinsi, get her out of there!” But the patrol ship was too close to the planet to risk jump, and at these distances its maneuvering advantage disappeared. Scan showed acceleration, but the need to keep the screens on full combat strength held it well below maximum. Then the rising curve took Paradox out of their line of sight, behind the planet. She would have to go closer to Paganini before she could pull away. If she could.
Vigilance couldn’t help. Their flank screens were still down, though the engineers kept saying, “Just another minute or two,” and the damaged assault carrier lobbed enough missiles at them to keep them busy, shifting so that those which broke through met solid shields.
“It’s not Hearne, on Despite,” Koutsoudas said a few minutes later. “Someone named Suiza.”
A moment later, someone said, “By the crew list, that’s a Jig. What’d they have, a mutiny?”
“Must have.” Heris had other things to worry about than who had killed whom on Despite. “But why are they here now?”
“They’re coming almighty fast,” Koutsoudas said. Their scan icon had the bright blue edge meaning a relative vee in major fractions of lightspeed. “Came out fast, and haven’t slowed. Their scans will be useless.”
“They’re running on maps,” Heris said. “Can they slow that thing by Xavier, or are they going to blow by?”
“Wait—there it is—they are braking—by timelag, that’s two hours back—” The scan fragmented, as the incoming ship’s relativistic motion skewed all the data. When it steadied again, Despite was only hours away. Now the audio broke up, until finally Heris could hear a very young voice announcing their arrival.
“Regular Space Service patrol craft Despite, Esmay Suiza commanding . . . in advance of a Familias Regnant force—” She probably hoped that would scare off the Benignity ships; Heris knew it wouldn’t. They had lost too much; they would fight to the death now, having no alternative.
“At least her weapons are hot,” Ginese said, as the newcomer lit up the scan screens like fireworks.
“No Jig can fight an admiral of the Compassionate Hand on his own flagship,” Oblo said. “He’s no fool. . . .”
Despite had arrived with too much relative velocity, and now she swung wide of Xavier, still trying to brake. “Fire now!” Ginese pleaded. “Dammit—microjump into position—do something—” But Despite rolled on.
A moment later, just as Paradox came back into line of sight, clawing its way up, its shields flared.
“Damn,” Heris said. “He’s going to lose them—” Now they could see the enemy cruiser, in the textbook position for killing smaller, faster ships. Its greater firepower had full weight now; the shields flared again and again, each time a little more. Heris wanted to close her eyes, but forced herself to watch. Toward the end, Tinsi must have realized his position was hopeless. Suddenly Paradox accelerated, full power—
“He cut the shields,” breathed Ginese. “He’s going to ram—”
“He’s too far away.” Koutsoudas was right; the Benignity commander hadn’t let Paradox get close enough for that. Instead, a final round of fire poured into the unprotected ship, and Paradox blew. The enemy cruiser’s shields sparkled briefly as it fended off debris. One thousand, eight hundred, twenty-three, Heris thought . . . no one was going to survive that blast.
“Well.” Koutsoudas looked up a moment, and rubbed his eyes. “Dammit—if that idiot on Despite had done something—anything—to distract that admiral . . .”
“Later,” Heris said. If they had a later. Even with Despite, the odds were no better than before, and she could not count on an inexperienced captain. Three to one, she faced—and here came the cruiser, and the other assault carrier.
“Shields are up,” said an engineering rating.
“Good,” said Heris. It didn’t make that much difference. They’d lost over half their remaining missiles; they were outgunned and too close to the planet to go into jump. But shields would help—at least delay the end.
The end came first to one of the assault carriers, the one with damaged shields. Heris, concentrating on the enemy cruiser, had no idea why the carrier suddenly burst and spewed its load of vehicles and personnel and heavy equipment into space. No one did, until afterward, when the sole survivor of the shuttle that had used its phase cannon told them. At the time, she assumed that Despite had gotten off a lucky shot.
The captain of the other assault carrier reacted by taking his ship down—trying to cut beneath Vigilance and perhaps also release his load. He paid for this mistake when he hit a drift of mines so crudely made that they neither showed on his sensors nor responded to countermeasures intended to make mines blow prematurely. Individually, or clustered at any distance, they could not have damaged the ship, but enough of them in direct contact, lodged in the many crevices a deep-space ship offered, blew a sizeable hole in the hull. The carrier immediately launched its drop shuttles, only to have most of them blown by other orbiting mines on the way down.
Heris had no leisure to enjoy his plight, for the remaining cruiser attacked with all its force. Vigilance faced the same problems as Paradox; its shields bled power from the drive, and kept them from using their superior speed and maneuverability. Through the maelstrom that combat made of their scans, no one could find Despite.
“If she’d only come up his rear,” Ginese said. “She couldn’t blow him, but she could distract him—take a little of the heat off us—”