Dreadnaught

“Three hundred thirty-three,” Carabali repeated. “Yes, sir. It’s weird. Maybe it means something.” She focused elsewhere. “Now! I want every Marine out of there now! If those fleet engineers drag their feet, knock them out and haul them along!”

Small detonations rocked the surface of the asteroid, throwing out fragments that soared into space out of the weak gravitational pull, atmosphere venting in many places into the vacuum of space. Geary checked the main display. Six minutes until the alien warships reached them. “It’s going to be very tight.”

Desjani nodded. “Captain Tulev, get your division under way and engage the enemy.”

“Understood,” Tulev replied. Leviathan, Dragon, Steadfast, and Valiant began accelerating toward the oncoming enemy.

“Captain, our dock is full. Sealing it now.”

“Very well. Invincible, why is a shuttle hanging outside your dock?”

Vente sounded as stiff as usual. “I am following proper procedure for loading sequences—”

“Get that shuttle docked now, or I’ll have you shot! All units, we have three minutes! I do not intend engaging these bastards while we’re engaged in shuttle recovery and at rest relative to this rock!”

Duellos’s battle cruisers had reached the enemy, hurling out specters that the enemy twisted to try to dodge, then the two forces lashed each other as they tore past.

“Everyone is clear,” Carabali reported. “All personnel accounted for. The final shuttle is en route Incredible.”

Geary stared for a moment at the display centered on the asteroid, seeing large portions of its outer surface collapsing inward or bulging outward in response to the spasms inside it.

“All shuttles recovered, Captain. Incredible is sealing her dock.”

“All units in Task Force Lima, maneuver independently and engage the enemy!”

Twenty-nine enigma warships were still coming, but they had to get past Tulev’s battle cruisers first. Though they hadn’t had a long time to accelerate, the battle cruisers were still deadly, and the enigma warships had to go through them if they wanted to reach the asteroid.

Specters volleyed out, followed within moments by hell-lance fire and grapeshot as the two forces clashed.

“They hit Valiant hard,” Geary heard someone saying, then realized he had been the one who spoke. But only sixteen alien warships were still coming, and led by Dauntless, the eight remaining Alliance battle cruisers were accelerating furiously toward them.

Desjani’s hand danced over her firing controls, and Dauntless shuddered slightly as specter missiles launched, then the battle cruiser’s hell lances speared out as well, aimed and fired automatically by combat systems reacting far faster than any human could. Volleys of grapeshot followed in the instant before the far faster moving alien warships slashed through the human ships in the blink of an eye.

Geary kept his eyes on the display as it updated rapidly in response to sensor reports from every ship in the fleet. Only three alien warships were still moving, and they were still heading straight for the asteroid, making no attempt to turn or slow down. “What the hell?”

An instant later, the three surviving enigma warships smashed into the asteroid while moving at sixty thousand kilometers per second.

No one spoke for a long moment as the displays updated to show nothing but a rapidly expanding cloud of dust where the asteroid and three enigma warships had once been. Geary finally tore his eyes from that, only to see that, once again, every other nearby enigma warship, whether badly damaged or completely knocked out, had self-destructed.

It was close to half an hour later when they saw the sole remaining enigma warship in the star system veering off when the Alliance light cruisers and half the destroyers came right for it as the rest of the destroyers braked to pick up the Marine. “Why do they sometimes kill themselves for what seem to be totally unnecessary reasons, and other times they show reasonable discretion in the face of the odds against them?” Geary wondered. His eyes went back to the assessments of the damage to the battle cruisers, focusing on Valiant and her seventeen dead.

“I don’t know,” Desjani replied, “and I don’t care anymore. If any of the aliens come within range of my weapons, I’ll remove any options from their futures.”

The destroyers intercepting the Marine slowed further, until Carbine could snag the suit and haul the scout aboard. “Goal!” The triumphant message arrived from the rescue force several minutes later, the entire group of light cruisers and destroyers by then accelerating back to the main body of the fleet.

“The destroyers are asking for ransom,” Carabali reported to Geary, looking considerably more relaxed than she had during the operation at the asteroid.

“Anything the Marines aren’t prepared to pay?”

“We’ll buy rounds for their crews at any bar wherever the fleet has liberty next, Admiral. Thank you.”

“I wasn’t going to leave that scout, General.”