Trial by Ice (A Star Too Far Book 1) Read online

  “Well gentlemen, here we go. Xan, I need you to load a program to the orbital batteries. Tero, Eduardo, you’ll need to monitor critical systems. I’m going to run the guns and do some fine tuning on the piloting.”

  “May I suggest Von Hess to handle the piloting, sir?” Eduardo said.

  William turned his head. “He’s rated for starships?”

  “I’ve yet to find a vehicle or vessel he cannot handle.”

  “Very well, send him up.” William nodded and wondered what he could do with a truly talented pilot.

  William clicked on the ship’s comm system. “In ten minutes, we burn. We’ve got one hour to dance, stay put until we give the all clear.”

  The navigation program was laid out before him. He gave one final scan to the critical systems. Everything was set. He tapped a gray icon and the clamps unhooked with a deep shudder. They were floating free, waiting.

  Von Hess entered with a limp and sat in the cloth couch. He attached the carbon leads that the dead man last wore.

  William gave him a nod. He’d never look at the quiet German quite the same after the massacre earlier. “Can you fly this?”

  Von Hess closed his eyes and nodded with a smile. “Of course, Mr. Grace, I can fly anything. How hard can it be?”

  William smirked and nodded. “The vector out can’t change, we’re locked into that. But with a ship this nimble, we can roll.”

  “Here we go, we’re burning in ten.” William tapped the program execution tab gently and watched as the numbers counted down. He turned to the display and watched the velocity of the marauder drop to match the station. He tapped again and let the screen split into the system view with the visual tiled alongside. The marauder slid into view.

  The corvette slowly edged away from the docking station.

  William held his breath. Part of him wanted the marauder to dock and leave him be, but another part wanted it to follow. Not just for the chase, but also to spare the militia another fight. A fight he was fairly sure they would lose.

  The screen showed the velocity remaining stable with zero acceleration. The bulky form hovered and turned slightly. The numbers began to rise. It was going to chase.

  “Xan, load it up! As soon as it’s clear of the needle, we’re going to open fire,” William said. The excitement was rising and a wicked little smile spread on his lips. He brought up the weapons control and laid out the program. His left hand throbbed. He glanced down and wondered how something that didn’t exist could hurt.

  “Von Hess, after the first barrage I need you to roll so that we can get the second. After that, keep the stronger set of fields facing them. I’ll handle the weapons.”

  Alarms sounded and a subtle metallic humming passed through the ship. The marauder had began to fire with prow mounted railguns. Sparks of light flickered on the top of the marauder as a barrage of missiles powered in.

  William gritted his teeth as the warheads came closer. He could feel the light hum of the repulsor field momentarily increasing the gravitational field to counteract the missiles. The mass driver opened up to intercept the missiles.

  Alarms flashed onto the display. The shields peaked and redlined as the missiles overwhelmed it. The railguns punched in for another volley. William braced himself.

  The ship rolled in a gentle arc allowing the stressed fields to bleed the energy they had retained. The remaining rounds impacted on the fresh field. William shot a glance at Von Hess. There was a slight smile across the pilots lips. “Well done Von Hess.”

  “They’ll clear the station in about thirty seconds,” Tero said.

  William knew that the missile barrage would take a few minutes to reload. He prepped his weapons program and watched as the marauder built velocity up.

  “Clear!” Tero yelled.

  William slapped his hand down onto the granite table and set the program into motion.

  Rear mounted batteries of lower caliber mass drivers expelled a stream of tungsten-nickel pellets. Each projectile contained a bit of energy but the combined force of the stream could overwhelm a repulsor grid. The marauder, small in the distance of the camera, winked with green flashes as the nickel impacted silently.

  “Orbital batteries have fired!” Xan yelled.

  The orbital batteries were arrayed around the planet in a simple spread. Each one out of sight of the others. William had generated a program that would deliver each of the projectiles into an orbit that would, hopefully, impact the marauder.

  The marauder tilted slowly, but not before a stream of the mass driver particles punished through the repulsor and impacted the hull. Railguns opened fire a split second later, driving a pair of depleted uranium slugs into it. Nanite particles charged into the hull in an incandescent white burn before winking out.

  William felt excited as he watched his program burn through and deliver a blow that they definitely felt. The marauders velocity was rising and the acceleration was growing at a rate that troubled him.

  “Mr. Xan, how long? Tero, everything good?”

  “Uh, four minutes,” Xan replied.

  “Well enough, Mr. Grace,” Tero called back.

  William slapped down the next program and hoped that they could handle the next barrage. He had no doubt the marauder learned and would deliver the next blow more decisively. He had to keep the attention on him and not on what was coming over the horizon.

  The marauder sparkled as both top and bottom batteries deployed another array of missiles. The prow railguns continued to pound the repulsor fields. The rotating of the corvette would only do so much to spread the damage out. Tero hummed to himself as the missiles approached.

  The missiles, after expending the initial fuel, coasted until they reached the corvette where they drove in with a renewed vigor.

  The mass drivers opened fire on the approaching missiles. The missile explosions coalesced in a field of plasma that blossomed onto the armor. The marauder’s railgun walked rounds onto the hull stitching a jagged trail in the nickel alloy armor.

  William tensed his stomach as the repulsors peaked into the red. His eyes stared unblinking until the readouts finally slid lower. Another barrage like that would overwhelm the heat sinks and the armor couldn’t take a sustained railgun assault.

  “Xan, give me something good.” William laid out the next weapons program.

  “It’s going to be close, they might get off another shot. Orbital batteries weren’t designed for this sort of thing.”

  “I can bring her around and cut the drive,” Von Hess said in a low tone.

  “Negative,” William called back. His hand hovered over the console. He held his breath and watched the display. Any second, he knew, any second. The desire to strike again was almost overwhelming.

  The marauder fired the railguns once more. The rounds impacted farther along the hull at a steeper angle. The heat each round generated was dispersed among more of the repulsor fields. William realized that this would be more than they could handle when the missiles landed. Already the repulsors were stressed.

  “William…” Tero called out. “We’re going to have—”

  “I know!” William snapped back. Think, think! What if the batteries missed? Had they already gone past and they hadn’t seen it? Ten seconds more and he’d strike back with something, anything.

  He counted down ‘til he reached four and something happened.

  At first it appeared like another barrage was incoming. The color was different and the position was random. Blinks of green and yellow flashed against the repulsor fields before an overwhelming light blinked out the display. Something hit the marauder. Something hit it hard.

  William slapped the console. The sensors were all recalibrating and the weapons fired blindly. The mass driver took in the last known position and wavered through a minute of angle to cover a probable grid of positions. The railguns compensated for the velocity and spouted out more rounds. The ship hummed as an electromagnetic shockwave slammed against it.
r />   “Eduardo, how long?” William yelled. The excitement was getting to him. The steely taste floated in the back of his mouth as the adrenaline was back. He needed to try and calm himself. This was going to be a long haul.

  “I don’t know!” Eduardo called out. He fidgeted and tapped the consoles cautiously with arms wreathed in scrolling figures.

  William sat forward and flexed the fingers on his right hand. The tactical display flickered on. The icon of the marauder showed it was still moving. Still in place. His heart dropped a second until he saw the acceleration was slowly dropping.

  “Hey, hey! We got something, they’re slowing down,” William yelled out.

  The celebration was short lived as the acceleration began to edge up again. But it was enough. Every meter they grew apart was another meter of breathing room for the repulsors to recharge. Every meter gave the mass drivers more time to engage the missiles. Railgun fire continued to pound against the repulsors but they were holding steady.

  “Ten minutes ‘til blink,” Von Hess said.

  The marauder seemed to pause as the acceleration winked to zero. Was this it? Were they going to fall back? William blinked his eyes and watched.

  The marauder reengaged the drives. The ship’s acceleration tripled.

  “Shit.” William slapped in another program. “Tero, can you see anything yet? How the hell?”

  “Uh, I don’t know, they shouldn’t be able to do that. They’re moving at nearly four gees, they aren’t designed for that.” He tapped at the console and sat back. “They repositioned the crew grav fields in line. Once you do that, you can’t realign. They’re giving it all they got to catch us now.”

  William stared up at the screen. The visual display popped back on again. Everything seemed slightly grainy as the sensors were still coming online. The marauder still glowed on the outer edge where the orbital battery had struck.

  “Can you hit them on the nose?” Tero asked.

  “What? Maybe. Why?” William replied. His stump ached and tingled.

  The weapons systems were computer controlled for maximum impact. The program preferred to work in concert with the other weapons for optimal damage instead of targeting individual points. They had the statistical proficiency that no human gunner ever would. But in regards to single shots, statistics wouldn’t cover the numbers.

  “They’ve changed the field layout, the repulsors aren’t tuned for that acceleration, the field is dragging behind.” Tero let the words hang. The very tip of the Hun marauder was unshielded.

  “Highlight where, I’m going to need to override and do it manually,” William said. He delved deeper into the command console rigging the weapons program for manual control.

  The nose of the marauder wore a dim orange overlay. A small area directly in the center was vulnerable. It would be a shot that only a railgun could make.

  William drifted his fingers over the console and watched as the impact point shifted on the marauder. It would take a direct hit to punch through the armored nose. The time to blink was drawing close. He sat back and took a deep breath.

  The marauder’s armor was finally beginning to cool enough that it didn’t glow. One entire edge was a ragged mess of slagged armor and wrecked launcher tubes. A bit closer and the Hun railguns would begin to fire once more. The repulsors were stressed enough from the last barrage.

  William realized if his repulsors were almost spent that the Huns must be maxed out as well. The time was now, he had to fire. “Hess, slam ‘em!”

  The mass drivers opened up into a less accurate spread. The green flashes of vaporized nickel peppered the entire leading edge of the accelerating marauder. One burst through and then another.

  The focal point changed for a split second and William twitched it aside. With a gentle tap he set off the first pair of railgun rounds. Each one sped from a Xeno designed turret and careened through the empty space. One of the rounds deflected off of the grav field but the other was funneled right in and exploded in a spectacular display of incandescent light.

  Cheers erupted as they had finally struck a blow that would hurt, if not cripple, the Hun marauder. The sparks from the impact cascaded and were slung out from the grav field as if a fountain of burnt iron gushed out. The embers glowed as they passed in the wake of the marauder. Heat dissipated tediously in a vacuum.

  William watched as the reload indicator of the railguns progressed. His feet tapped back and forth. It seemed sluggishly slow. The room was completely silent, only the hum of the grav drive bled into the room. “How much longer?”

  “Two minutes,” Xan said.

  Two minutes. It’d be close. The railguns might load in time. If it did, he could quite possibly slam another round home. Did they know? They had to know.

  The railgun had to bleed heat that. Fire too fast and the projectile would weld itself into the barrel. The reload indicator crawled upwards. Orange, then yellow, then just turning to green.

  “In three!” Xan said as he hunched forward in the chair.

  “No! We’ll get her,” William cried out. He slammed down his hand onto the console and let loose a round. The last thing he saw was the nose of the marauder panning to the side.

  The consoles winked. A low hum passed through the floor. The corvette had slipped through the Haydn field and was now two AUs farther.

  William stared at the empty screen and felt the palm of his hand burning. Did he hit it? Was the round already out? He licked his lips and looked at the others. Everyone was smiling. He felt relieved, but also cheated—he could've landed a killing blow… or had one landed on him.

  “Is that it?” Eduardo asked.

  The adrenaline ebbed. William released all of his muscles and suddenly felt an empty place inside of him. That thrill, that feeling, the dread mixed with the excitement, was seductive. Now he was just tired. His left hand itched furiously—all he could do was grit his teeth.

  “We’ll know shortly if they’re going to follow,” William said. He ran his hand over his eyes and stretched back. A number caught his eye. “Xan, can you verify position?”

  “We, uh, we went farther than she would have,” Xan said as he leaned towards the display.

  “Huh. I’m going down to see the Haydn,” Tero replied quietly, and walked out of the room.

  “I’m not sure I…” Eduardo trailed off.

  “The Haydn drive skips over the top of gravity waves. It’s like a big sine wave. You get far enough away from a gravity well and skip across the trough. You drop out near the peak of the next gravity wave and power through to the falling edge and blink again.”

  Eduardo nodded slowly.

  “We measure the drive by how efficient it is at reaching the peak. The greater the efficiency, the less time you spend burning between peaks. Right now the distance is small as the waves are spaced close together, but in between the stars it can take weeks.”

  “Sounds like a filter in an electronic circuit,” Eduardo said.

  “You’ll have to ask Tero about it. All I know is we are about eight percent more efficient than we should have been.”

  William relaxed a bit more and kept watch on the screen. He was hungry and wanted nothing more than to eat and drink a proper meal. The slight smells of something cooking wafted through the ventilation system.

  Tero returned with a smile. “The Haydn is sealed, looks unusual, Gracelle maybe?” He shrugged and sat back down.

  Eduardo engaged him in conversation about the details of the Haydn.

  “If you don’t mind, Mr. Grace, I’m going to rest, it can be overwhelming,” Von Hess said.

  “Absolutely, you did good work,” William said. He’d been surprised at the versatility of the strider pilot.

  The bridge grew silent as everyone kept an eye on the display. The marauder had turned, ever so slightly, and would need time to get back on the right tack or it might turn around. William saw no reason to speak to the rest of the crew yet, not until he knew if the Hun marauder was in p
ursuit.

  He ran through the diagnostics. They were banged up, but nothing critical yet. Not that they could do much, anyway.

  Then it appeared. William crouched forward and smiled an animal smile. The Hun marauder was back, far behind, where the corvette should have come in. The distance was too far to get a good visual on the prow. It held in position for a few moments before the velocity began to rise. William kept his eye on the acceleration.

  The marauder accelerated again up to 4Gs.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Beyond

  William sat on the edge of a rimmed white table. Eyes rose from the seats as everyone waited for him to speak. Bowls were scattered everywhere as the survivors indulged in whatever they wanted. The world of privation had ended.

  “They hit us hard. The only thing that kept us alive was one of the orbital batteries slamming them. It knocked out half of their missile batteries.” William shifted and looked into the tired eyes of those around him. Did they really trust him to get them out of this? The thought still surprised him. “We’ve got an advantage: we jump farther. But they are faster, much faster, in the peaks. We’re going to make the next jump before they do, but the jump after that is a lot longer and they might catch us before we can jump again.”

  “So, uh, Mr. Grace,” Avi said, standing. “What can we do?”

  William looked around at the faces around him. They were gaunt, wounded, tired, but still eager. They were dirty, black earlobes, gray cheeks, cut, burned and bruised. If he felt this lousy, he was sure everyone else did. The last thing he would want to do is sit and wait, so why would they?

  “Crack open every single box, container, and locker. Find something we can use, anything, I’m open to ideas,” William said.

  They nodded and the mood changed from a complacency of a passenger to the professionalism of a crew with a mission.