Confederation -- 14

Chapter 14

Our three-ship squadron dropped out of FTL near the Pug-bears' and Pugs' homes. They came from a loose double system where the two small suns orbited each other in a kind of long-distance, elliptical dance. Their size and spectra were identical, so I thought they'd probably been formed at the same time and place. At this point, they were separated by almost two light-years, a distance that led me to believe they were gradually moving farther apart. If so, the pair would eventually separate, and each would go its own way.

Neither star provided much light to its planetary system. They were dim, and both systems were full of fine dust particles that attenuated the primary's light. This explained why the Pugs seemed to prefer darker environments. The Pug-bears' planet orbited fairly close to its sun. The Pugs' was farther out. I'd noticed that the Pug-bears didn't have the same degree of aversion to light that the Pugs showed, and that was probably the reason.

The entire stellar system was barren, with only a single planet and a paucity of smaller objects. The dust probably accounted for most of the matter in the system. Why it hadn't condensed into planets was a question I couldn't answer.

As sisters, the stars had much the same chemical composition, a fact that probably accounted for some of the alienness of the two races. I had initially learned these facts during the latter part of our voyage to the planet of the Pug-bears' only failure – Kasm's planet – unless you could consider the Earth a failure, but the outcome there was still in doubt.

We dropped out of FTL on the outskirts of the Pug-bears' system. The Pugs' star was on the far side of the Pug-bear system, and that fact made me feel a little more secure. If the Pugs were in possession of some FTL ships, it would provide a little more time for them to reach our position should they be minded to investigate or assist their masters.

From the instant we arrived in normal space mode, our passive sensors determined that the single planet that orbited the star was currently attended by four FTL ships parked in close proximity to the sole space station. The light we saw was about six hours old, though, so the ships might have moved. The only other objects that we could locate were some small moonlets that orbited the planet at a far distance. The space station was well inside their orbit, and there might have been a few comets, but we didn't look for those.

Frazzle was carefully observing his instruments, as was Liz, and I watched from the observation seating. He eventually pushed back and said, "Dey have four ships, and maybe one being repaired now. What's we going to do?"

I answered rather more casually than perhaps I should have, "Do? We're going to capture all four of them."

He turned to look directly at me, his eyes wide, and asked, "How?"

"See if you can pick up any Sunny comm chatter. Getting in contact with the Sunny part of the crew has worked well in the past. They'll probably let us board, and then we can clear out the enemy crews."

It had worked before. I saw no reason that it wouldn't work this time also, except for the necessity of coordinating boarding attacks on four vessels simultaneously.

"I already tried Ansible comm for Sunnys," he replied. "Dere's no sign of any of my people on the comm. I don't know if they are in those ships or maybe all dead – killed by Pug-bears, maybe."

The Pug-bears did have that regrettable habit. They were so sure of themselves that they didn't hesitate to kill and eat members of their ship crews, either for amusement or because they just thought they needed a snack. It seemed short-sighted to me. They couldn't fly an FTL themselves. On the other hand, perhaps the ships were crewed by Pugs.

"Frazzle, do you know if any of the Pugs can pilot an FTL ship?" I asked. I knew they could fly the shuttle-craft. The shuttle seats were designed for their narrow rear ends, making them somewhat uncomfortable for humans.

"Dey didn't fly the big ships before –" He hesitated, thinking about it. "Maybe dey do now. I don't know, but I remember some talk of making the ships friendly for Pugs so they could be flying. If the Pugs are the only ones on the ships, they won't let us board through transporters. Maybe we have to use spacesuits and go through the cargo holds?"

I didn't like that speculation, but it might be our only approach. We'd have to coordinate our attack and move very quickly. I didn't want our people outside our ships if the Pugs decided to fire up their engines and flee. We'd have to stop to pick up everyone and wouldn't be able to give chase.

The other thing that bothered me was that our arrival wave was irrevocably heading towards them at the speed of light. It would take a little over six hours from where we'd dropped in to reach their position, so we had to plan quickly.

The barren system didn't offer any cover for sneaking up on them either. We'd approached in the shadow of Uranus before, and that had allowed us to get closer than we might otherwise have done. I turned to Liz and asked, "What do you think?"

My wife once again proved that she wasn't just a pretty face. There was a very sharp mind behind those good looks.

She answered, "Let's load all of the Marines and Sim-tigers into the available shuttles. The three shuttles will carry nearly everyone, and we've conveniently got three shuttle mounts on Rudy's big FTL. If he moves in as if he were one of their ships – have Whistle do all of the talking – he might be able to get close enough for the shuttles to dump the suited men where they can attack the ships."

I liked the idea and added, "We can hang back to intercept if any of them get their wind up and try to get away. If Rudy approaches from the right quarter, it will take him close by two of the three unattached ships. Some of the men can move from his hull when they're close. The big shuttle can take the Sim-tigers onto the space station. We don't have suits for them, so they're limited to either transporters or docking tubes. If the shuttle can mate up with a port on the station, the Sim-tigers can clean it out and take the attached ship while they're at it."

She grinned in anticipation, "That might work. I think we'd better be on our way in as soon as the attack starts. We might have to pick up a lot of men if they somehow miss their jumps. I don't want any of them to go on a one-way trip."

The regular comm system wasn't limited to radio transmissions. It could also use directional laser carriers. We linked up with low-powered lasers and shortly had the plan hashed out with Rudy and Holmes.

Our Marines moved into the shuttle, as did the Sim-tigers. I started to go, but Liz grabbed my arm and said, "Where do you think you're going, Buster?"

"I've got to go with the men," I replied.

"Oh, no, you don't. Your place is here. They can do their job just fine without you participating in every boarding action. We need you onboard where you can direct any ship action. If they start to escape, you'll have to decide how to handle the situation. I'm not going to do it myself. Remember, you're the only one of us who has any space combat experience," she said.

Honestly, I hadn't given it any thought. I'd always been the go-to guy who did all the fighting. It didn't feel right for me to stay back while my men went into battle, but she was right. Having survived a battle with five armed Pug shuttle-craft, I was the only one who had more than a theoretical grasp of how to fight with our FTL. I took a deep breath and then settled back in my seat, "Okay, you're right, as usual. Let's get this show on the road."

Rudy's big ship was braking hard as it approached the space station. He'd accelerated quickly to nearly light speed to give the Pugs as little warning as possible. Rudy turned his ship and ran his Em-drive full out as he tried to slow down.

Our initial arrival wave would expand as it traveled, and we'd arrived far enough out that I hoped the Pugs wouldn't detect it, or if they did, perhaps they wouldn't realize that three ships had dropped in together. Rudy's larger ship might confuse them. It was big enough to cause a more significant signal. With any luck, they'd think it was large enough to account for our entire entry wave. That seemed to be the case since it was now almost at the point where our entry wave would have reached the enemy's location. So far, they hadn't responded.

I found it irritating to have to wait through the communications lag period. I'd noticed that the Pugs wouldn't use the FTL communication system for any in-system purpose. They reserved it exclusively for interstellar distances. Accordingly, we limited ourselves to radio comm as we attacked.

At the rate Rudy was approaching, the Pugs would have maybe another couple of minutes before their query signal would reach him. That was assuming they saw our entry wave and responded with a query.

That assumption wasn't actually based on their expected behavior. The Pugs were so used to being the only ones with spaceships that they didn't keep regular watches. The Sunnys would have done that, but if there were none of them on the ships, it was just possible that the Pugs were fooling around or fighting among themselves. Their race was a non-technologically oriented, iron-age society. They didn't live very long, and their primary interest lay in competing for resources and breeding rights. This kept them busy and focused on each other rather than other possible threats. I hoped that we'd get lucky in this regard.

The minutes passed, and then our FTL communicator clicked twice. Rudy had activated his system and sent out two pulses, which meant that he'd received a query from the station or the ships. They knew he was coming. I hoped that Whistle was on the comm, sending them a convincing story. He could speak enough Pug to communicate with them on a fundamental level.

In another thirty minutes, Rudy's ship would be in attack range for the shuttles. We'd given him a thirty-minute lead and then followed at the same acceleration. I wanted to be there shortly after the attack started.

Our two ships were braking rapidly, and our ETA was about right. I judged that the Marines would be inside the enemy ships when we arrived at a reasonable shooting distance. Our anti-matter guns had a nearly infinite range in vacuum, but the beams would rapidly attenuate in this dusty solar system.

From that point, things happened quickly. I think my mind goes into combat mode and is highly focused on each aspect of action, but time doesn't seem to amount to much whenever I'm in a battle.

As we approached, we could see that the shuttles had separated, and the larger one was approaching the space station. There was no way we could see the individual men against the background of the planet. They were to keep radio silence until they'd breached the hatch of the most distant FTL ship. That group would then let us know they were inside. That signal would free the other two groups to broadcast their status.

We had slowed down to planetary speeds. Our ship's internal gravity system compensated nicely for the deceleration and allowed us to carry out maneuvers that would have killed humans on a more primitive ship.

Suddenly, the radio crackled, and the party began, "We're in target three. Encountering no resistance in the hold or corridors."

Team two chimed in, "We must have all of them. We've got heavy fighting going on. They're shooting at us with some type of projectile weapons. I've got two men down and needing evac."

I waited to hear from team one, but they were quiet. That didn't seem right to me. Their target had been the smallest FTL, and as a result, we'd only assigned a light strike force. I hoped they hadn't encountered anything they couldn't handle.

Before I could call them, the shuttle that had headed for the space station reported that the Sim-tigers were through the hatch. They hadn't had any difficulty mating up and docking. The tigers did have a radio, but their first instinct was to fight, and I doubted that I'd hear from them before they'd cleaned the place out.

Team One was still quiet. Team Two was gradually making progress, and Team Three was about to reach the bridge of their targeted ship. They called in shortly after that and reported that all resistance had ceased. They'd killed all of the Pugs on board and hadn't found any Sunnys or Pug-bears. That was one down and three to go.

Right after their report, target one's Em-drive fired up, and it began to accelerate at maximum rate, heading out of the system. I tried calling the lieutenant in charge but got no answer from anyone.

We didn't want that ship getting away and going for help, and as a contingency, I'd been ready with the weapons console. The system was tracking all three of the free-floating ships. I focused on the accelerating ship and carefully aimed at the drive package. The ship was heading directly away from us, and it was a simple shot.

The gun did its work, and the drive simply disappeared along with one of the FTL vanes. A gout of atmosphere shot from the breached hull, and the ship's lights went out. It was coasting away from us but no longer accelerating.

Team Two reported that they were in possession of their ship. They'd killed a large number of Pugs in the process, but that didn't hurt my feelings. I radioed back to transport their wounded to the shuttle bay and stand by for pickup. Rudy's ship had the most complete medical system, and the wounded would need to go there for treatment.

We now held two ships, but the third was disabled. I dithered for a moment, wondering if I should chase the disabled ship to find out what happened to the attack squad or head to the space station to help the Sim-tigers.

My dilemma was solved when Kasm contacted me. "We've taken the station. There were a lot of Pug-bears here, but we killed most of them. There are still a few barricaded in one arm of the station with some Pugs, but we've got everything under control. The FTL that we thought was being repaired is apparently being salvaged. It's gutted and just a hull. We couldn't go in. It's hard vacuum there. We've also rescued a few Sunnys," he sent in his clear mental voice.

That left the disabled ship. We pulled alongside after a brief chase, and Frazzle grabbed the thing with our gravity field. A small boarding party jumped across the gap and entered.

They quickly reported back that there was no life on the ship. Then they changed that story when they found one of the Marines still alive and locked in a storage closet.

Several Pug-bears had ambushed the boarding party. The creatures had taken mental control over the men and had frozen them in place. The last man to board had somehow managed to avoid mental capture and had locked himself in a cabin before being sensed.

The Pug-bears had realized he was in there, and he'd suffered their fearsome mental attack and had been unable to move until we'd shot a hole in the ship. The vacuum had killed the Pug-bears, but they'd ripped the other nine members of the boarding party to shreds first.

I felt terrible. This was a loss that we could ill afford. I hadn't considered what would happen to men who couldn't shield themselves against the Pug-bears' mental attack. The loss focused my mind on the desirability of creating spacesuits for the Sim-tigers.

The Sim-tigers were immune to this kind of control and were more than a match for the Pug-bears. One-on-one with no weapons, the Sim-tigers could win almost all of the time. With their swords, there was no contest between the two creatures. The Pug-bears always lost.

If a human could shoot, they'd usually win, provided they'd hit the Pug-bear in a vulnerable area, but if they fell under the alien's mental thrall, they always lost. I was the only human that I knew of who could fight the enemy's mental control and win.

I resolved to include at least two Sim-tigers on every boarding raid from now on. If the strike force encountered a Pug-bear, the Sim-tigers could take care of it. The humans could handle the Pugs. That way, the pairing of our two species provided an immense advantage.

We'd cleaned up the mess, transported the wounded to the medical facility, and evacuated the space station. The Sim-tigers had eliminated all of the resistance there shortly after their last communication, and we were happy to discover that the station held enough spare parts to allow us to patch up the damaged ship.

We'd ended up with twelve casualties and gained control of three FTL ships and three more small shuttles. One FTL was seriously damaged, and I wasn't sure it would be repairable. We looked it over briefly, and I regretfully decided to scrap it. There was too much damage and no parts. Not wanting to leave the hulk floating around for someone else to salvage, we used the gravity point source to boost it into a sunward orbit.

As far as I knew, there had been no signals from the station or ships requesting help, but I still wanted to get out of the system quickly. There was just one task to accomplish before we left.

I wanted to isolate the Pug-bears on their planet. They may have had some shuttles on the surface, but we'd seen nothing of them. Even so, I didn't want to leave the space station in place. It gave them access to FTL travel, which was the central part of the problem.

If they'd stay on their planet, I was willing to let them live. I just didn't want them free to raid other planets. They were too dangerous.

I realized it was a nasty thing to do, but I decided to lock onto the station along with the gutted FTL. Our gravity point source could slow it down enough so that its orbit would decay. I didn't care about the environmental damage or the Pug-bears enough to worry about what would happen when the huge mass fell to the surface.

The station massed enough that it took both my ship and Rudy's to slow it down. We strained against it for over an hour before it began to descend. Then we released the thing, retreated to a more distant orbit, and watched.

When the station struck the atmosphere, it created a spectacular light show as it broke up and fell. It was so large that the majority of it didn't burn up. Instead, it fell in three huge fragments that probably gave the local Pug-bears a considerable headache when they struck.

Fires were visible on the surface as we accelerated out of the system on our way to the planet of the Pugs.