Victorious Dead (The Asarlaí Wars Book 2) Read online

  “That’s great, Ragkor.” Vas jumped in as soon as he paused. Problem with experts was that they would keep going on about their interests far beyond anything needed. “Can you get around them and have you made visuals on the buoy?”

  “Yes, ma’am, on both counts. We can get through the debris, but we’re going to have to do a long evac walk out to get the buoy.”

  He didn’t sound the least concerned about such a thing. Vas didn’t feel the same way at all. Long evac meant going with one of the extended mag-clamp cables outside of the shuttle. Along with most of the tech of this gilded ship, those cables were extremely new and, in Vas’s mind, not fully tested. They’d lost a crewmember two months ago on a retrieval mission with those. Since they’d had to stop taking mercenary missions, Dilth had been their only fatality. One Vas didn’t want to repeat no matter what she knew her tech heads were going to say.

  “There has to be another way to get it, Ragkor.” She needed that buoy, but she also didn’t need to lose more friends and crew.

  “Captain, I checked it out. The cables work fine now,” Mac said with a bit more defensiveness than normal.

  “I checked his work, Captain. I also had Walvento check the lines here. They are sound,” Ragkor said. The slight pauses as he spoke told Vas he was doing what he felt was right.

  Damn it. She’d wanted her second-in-command to move past mindlessly following orders, but this wasn’t the time for that. She knew the Warrior Wench couldn’t get through that field, or even close to the shuttle. Ragkor knew that as well.

  “We can find another way to get it. That’s too much risk for those cables. I don’t trust them. Do you hear me? That’s an order. Stand down.” She tried to make her voice sound military in the hopes he’d automatically respond.

  “Captain? Walvento here. Ragkor had to switch to internal comm for the walk about.”

  Vas tightened her grip on the arm of her chair. She’d briefly wondered what would happen once they did get Deven back to himself and she had two seconds-in-command. It wouldn’t matter now though. After this stunt, either Ragkor would be dead or she’d have to lock him up in the brig.

  “I need you to report exactly what that bastard is doing—and tell him I called him that, and I will be getting payback for him disobeying orders.”

  Walvento still had the main shuttle comm to ship open, but she heard his voice drop as he used the shuttle-only comm to Ragkor’s suit. He must have been completely ready to go before he checked in and had been running final checkups as they spoke.

  Part of her admired him for finally disobeying the rules. But she wasn’t going to let him know that. Not to mention that he still had to survive this. Then, admiration or not, she would have to remind him who was the captain and which rules he could bend.

  “Done. He apologized but said the ships closing in might make waiting for another way in a problem.”

  “What?” Vas spun around and pointed to Mac.

  He flustered about but shrugged. “Nothing. Captain. There are no ships anywhere near us or the shuttle.” He studied the screen a few more seconds then looked back up, his eyes wide. “There’s nothing, I swear!”

  “Walvento, ask my second what the hell he is talking about. Are you seeing anything on your end?” She called the long-range screen to the viewer at her chair, but she didn’t see anything. A quick look to the communications station told her they weren’t picking up anything either.

  “He says he just knows,” Walvento said but then started talking to the other comm. “I can’t tell her that. You want her to lock my ass up too? Seriously? Crap.” Then his voice came back louder. “Captain, Ragkor would like to take this time to mention he is a level three pre-cog. He estimates we have about a half-hour before three class-five attack ships arrive.”

  9

  V as let all of those words sink in for about thirty seconds, then kept the most crucial ones, and shoved the rest aside to be dealt with later. “Whose ships are they? And if they’re that close, why aren’t we picking them up?” Up until two months ago, the assumption would have been Commonwealth enforcers, or commissioned ships running under the Commonwealth flags. But since the Commonwealth had been AWOL for two months, and there was no chatter of them coming out of their hidey-holes, those ships could be anyone.

  There were many other empires out there who would gladly move in to take over the Commonwealth, and a few were close enough to have sent scouts two months ago who would be getting here now.

  Walvento swore a few times, but it was muted. She heard his words, but they weren’t aimed at Vas or the ship. He came back a second later. “He doesn’t know, he says his pre-cog only goes so far. Also, he said what he’s trying to do to get around the nuns’ explosives is a bit touchy and he needs to focus. Those were his words, not mine. Not at all. You know that, right?” Walvento was not a small man, and as a master weapons expert, he wasn’t easily scared. But Vas swore she heard his voice go up at the last line.

  “I know and I agree. In your opinion, can he complete the job, return inside the shuttle and you all get back here before those ships arrive?” She was very glad Marwin was on that shuttle. He’d be able to shave precious minutes off their return trip.

  Walvento paused, “Aye. Rather, I think so, he’s almost to the buoy now. And Marwin flies like the demons of Alirah are after him, so I’d say we—” His voice was swallowed by an explosion.

  “Walvento, come in.” Vas motioned to Xsit who was already frantically trying to call him back. Static filled the comm line. The long-range scanners were scrambled as well—whatever exploded had a pulse weapon attached to it.

  Vas leapt out of her chair and ran to Gosta’s station. “Mac, be ready to get as close as we can. If we have to move in, keep the shields as high as you can get them. Gosta, what just happened?”

  The main scanners might have been temporarily shut down, but Gosta had far more complicated equipment than the rest of the ship.

  “I’m not sure, Captain.” Gosta was in his zone, flipping through a dozen screens at a time, making small adjustments, then flipping through again. “Well, something blew up, but I think it was more for…there we go.”

  He finally settled on a screen.

  The area looked similar to what the main screen had shown before the explosion. The shuttle looked intact but was listing and had a reddish glow around it. There was a small dot that appeared connected to the ship, but it too was drifting.

  Vas tapped the screen. “Is that Ragkor? Are any of them alive?” If they were going to have to mount a rescue mission, and a fast one at that, she needed to know there was some hope.

  “I have to assume it is he, and I can’t be certain. My scanners are having a difficult time with the interference, but I do believe we could assume some of them are alive.”

  Vas hated it when Gosta drew out an answer—not only was it annoying, it always meant he was concerned about something and was trying to gain more time to sort it out.

  When he didn’t add any more, Vas put her hand on his shoulder. “I think we need to prepare to move in and retrieve our shuttle. We won’t be able to get the buoy, but if we have potential hostiles closing in on us, we need to get our people out of there.”

  Gosta bobbed his head and returned to fiddling with the scanners, but the tension went out of his back. That was one of the reasons he made a horrific second-in-command, even just a half of one. He wasn’t good at big decisions on the fly.

  “Mac, you heard me, how close can we get?” Vas turned to go over to Mac’s pilot station when Gosta started jumping around.

  “They are alive! At least Ragkor is and the shuttle seems to be trying to re-engage engines.” Gosta flipped his screen so that the image from it took over the still static filled one in the front of the command deck.

  Vas let out a sigh. The small tethered dot was moving again with a purpose. Ragkor was using one of the suit boosters to move closer to the buoy.

  The shuttle was still listing, but
the thruster lights were flickering. Even though they weren’t staying on, at least that meant someone was still alive to be trying. With any luck, both of them were.

  “Mac, still work on a plan to get us through at least part of that debris field. Bathie, you work with Xsit and figure out a way to get around this interference. We still don’t have normal eyes on them, which means they can’t see out either. I need to talk to them.”

  The command deck was silent except for a few mutterings from Mac and an odd chirp or two from Xsit. The small birdlike communications officer was head to head with Bathie as they worked on finding a way to get through the static.

  “Are our communications all right? We can pick up things, just not them, correct?” Vas said over her shoulder as she studied the screen. There were some huge pieces of debris out there. Not all of the chunks of those massive gray ships vaporized, and some of those pieces were in the local field around the buoy.

  “Aye, Captain, aside from still not picking up anything of the ships coming toward us, we’re picking up all chatter except our people out there.”

  “Mac, I need you to turn the ship’s communications array five points to the left. Gosta, get ready to boost the signal where I say, when I say. Xsit and Bathie, I want you to send a narrow communications beam targeted at that hunk of gray ship on the upper edge of the screen.”

  It was times like these she appreciated having the smart people she did—even if they were often pains in the ass. No questions were asked, as all four immediately jumped to her plan and made it happen. The angle of the array would put their outgoing communications in line with the massive debris. If boosted and targeted tightly, they should be able to open a temporary communications link to the shuttle.

  “Done.” Bathie shouted out along with a chirp from Xsit. Half a second later Mac and Gosta echoed it.

  “Excellent. Now open the channel.” A red light on the console on the arm of her chair flashed. Vas hit her comm. “Walvento and shuttle crew, we’re moving in to assist. Can you get Ragkor back on board and what is your status?”

  “Captain, Marwin and I are in better shape…shuttle…get to th…over.”

  The good news was they were alive. Bad news was that her way of going around whatever caused the communications block didn’t completely work.

  “I don’t know what you hear on your end, but we’re hearing scrambled communications. Any chance of wheeling Ragkor in?”

  “I’m in better…situation…are, Captain.” Ragkor’s voice was broken up as Walvento’s had been but welcome to hear. The unique communications setup tagged them into the shorter-range comm Ragkor had.

  “Good to hear you too, Ragkor. I need you to get your ass back to the shuttle immediately.” Vas was grateful that her little trick enabled them to communicate directly with Ragkor as well as the shuttle, but they needed to keep this short.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw that Mac was waving to get her attention, so Vas turned back to him. “What?”

  “Sorry, Captain. I think I can get us close enough to help them, but they need to get Ragkor back in and at least start the thrusters. If they can move that shuttle to here”—he took over access to the main screen and electronically jabbed a point in the field—“I can get them.”

  The area he was pointing at still looked obstruction-filled for a ship the size of the Warrior Wench; it also looked like an unhealthy distance for a damaged shuttle. And if Ragkor was right about the shrouded vessels heading their way, they were out of time anyway.

  “Let’s do it then.” Vas reopened communications with the shuttle and Ragkor. “This is an order. Ragkor, you will get to the shuttle, with or without the buoy. Walvento, as soon as you can secure the doors after he gets inside, you will force every bit of energy aside from life support into those thrusters and hit them.”

  Mac brought the engines fully online, but kept the speed slow. They weren’t in debris now, but they would be soon enough.

  “I can’t get—” Ragkor’s words cut off, but a few moments later, the shuttle’s flickering thrusters came to life.

  Vas swore. She had no idea what Ragkor meant to say, or if he was on board the shuttle. But she knew Walvento wouldn’t have started the thrusters without either him being there or if it was no longer an issue.

  “Let’s get them. We might have visitors any moment now. Gosta? Is the ghosting system picking up anything?” Vas had no idea if the Commonwealth, or anyone else for that matter, had advanced tech that included a shrouding program, nor why they would be trying to sneak up on Vas and her crew. Although to be fair, they could be here after the same thing she was. There was no way the destruction Aithnea caused went unnoticed.

  Gosta pounded his console keys a few moments, then looked up and shook his head. “Nothing. Even ghosting, I can’t pick up any ships heading our way. This was a prototype system so maybe it’s not working correctly?”

  Vas nodded. Like all the new mystery toys on this ship, it wasn’t going to be something they could count on. Or the ships coming at them had already found a way around the ghosting program.

  Bathie and Xsit kept trying to regain communications with the shuttle or its crew, but nothing came through except static. By moving the ship closer, they lost the direct beam Gosta had created and whatever was causing the static was still in effect.

  Swearing from Mac’s station pointed out more bad news. The shuttle succeeded in moving forward, but not as far as Mac had hoped. There was still a lot of debris between them and their crew.

  Vas thumbed open her comm to the med labs. “Terel, any chance we could use that damn machine to pick up our people?” Gosta was the resident expert but he was still frantically trying to do calculations—most likely sending scenarios to Mac for the best way in. As if there was one. Terel had made studying the particle mover a serious hobby though.

  “Sorry, but no. There’s too much debris out there. The mover wouldn’t be able to discern what and whom it was trying to get. Too many signatures.” Her way of saying bodies, and parts of them, from the original explosion. Even dead they could be picked up by the particle mover.

  “Damn it. Keep moving in, Mac.” She kept her eye on the screen. Vas was one of the best single-fighter pilots around, and she knew it. She also knew Mac could fly circles around her when it came to flying a monster like the Wench.

  “But, Captain…” Mac cut off his whine when she started to turn. “Aye, Captain.”

  She knew he was about to complain about the potential damage to his ship. Never mind that the Wench belonged in name to Vas, most of her crewmembers now had a fondness for it that almost eclipsed that of their former ship, the Victorious Dead.

  He cut the speed and they crept closer. Vas and the command deck crew all got very close up views of the debris her former mentor had left behind. Vas silently raised her left fist and touched her chin and then her heart in tribute. Aithnea went out the way any warrior would want to go. Fast. And she took a hell of a lot of enemies with her.

  The distance was still too great, and the shuttle was listing badly now. The Warrior Wench had extendable claws but they were used for small asteroids, not something easily squishable like a shuttle.

  “Captain? What’s pushing the shuttle?” Xsit said.

  Vas had been staring ahead, but her thoughts were trying to resolve the problem—she had noticed that the very lopsided shuttle was slowly creeping toward their side.

  The movement wasn’t clean, sort of jerky, and it was more than a little odd seeing it go sideways, but a moment later it had straightened out. It was now heading toward them ass first.

  “Gosta? What the hell is going on?” Vas’s people would probably have claimed some spirits from the nunnery were lending a helping hand. But Vas thought more like the members of the late convent, there was no help from beyond the dead.

  “They are pushing it,” Mac answered before Gosta could, but Gosta popped his head up and nodded. “Aye, Captain. They are pushing it.”
/>   Vas looked back at both men, wondering if there was some kind of mental illness on board. “With what? It’s not like a busted cruiser on a dirt road.”

  “They are using something….” Gosta’s voice drifted off as he focused on something on his screens.

  Mac cut the engines. “I don’t know that they can get inside if we’re moving, Captain. Permission to go to the landing bay?”

  Vas nodded. The shuttle moved in closer, and she saw two shapes behind it, both with suit thrusters. But those thrusters couldn’t have moved that shuttle that far so fast.

  Then she saw a large spherical object connected to the two suit thrusters. One that looked exactly like the buoy.

  She shook her head as the entire conglomeration vanished from sight. She flicked open the comm to the landing bay.

  “Are they all in?”

  “Closing doors now, Captain,” Mac yelled over the sounds of the bay doors closing. “The shuttle did get a little scraped up; I had to use the claw to drag it in. But they’re all on board. Please tell me you’re going to let me look at that gift your friends left?”

  Vas knew that tone of voice all too well. Before Jakiin’s death, defending the crew and ten shiploads of refugees, Jakiin and Mac had been the biggest troublemakers in the world. Especially where tech or trying to make money were involved.

  Since Jakiin’s death, Mac had mostly settled down. Apparently, the magic of whatever this buoy actually was sent him right back down the old path.

  “Secure the buoy in a locked decon chamber. Keyed to me only, Mac.”

  Klaxons cut off any response he was going to give and three class-five attack ships appeared directly outside the debris field.

  10

  “ Maintain shields and try to hail those ships,” Vas said, then started swearing as more information came online. They were definitely Commonwealth ships, at least the markings and their codes identified them as such. While surface scans confirmed that they were registered as class-five attack ships, they didn’t look like any Vas had ever seen.