Privateer by James Doohan

Author:James Doohan [Doohan, James]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: High Tech, Space Opera, General, Science Fiction, Adventure, Fiction
ISBN: 9780671578329
Publisher: Baen
Published: 1999-10-14T23:00:00+00:00

to the jump point.”

“Yessir.” The same reluctance was in the pilot’s voice. It went against nature for a Speed to give up a target. . . .

Knott watched grimly as the protective screen of destroyers was peeled away from the enemy cruiser. “They’re short of ordnance,” he said.

The tac officer looked up. “That’s what the AI thinks, too,” she said.

The task group going for the cruiser opened out the formation and, speeding over their own front lines, folded over her like the petals of a carnivorous flower.

“That wave’s going to get in with parasite bombs,” Knott said, his eye on the tank. “Ops. Ready with long-range launch.”

A slight quiver went through the fifteen thousand tons of the Invincible as her own missiles—massive things half the size of a Speed, with their own high-grade AIs and countermeasure suites—moved from the magazines to the launch rails.

“I have a solution.”

“Launch.” A fading rumble from beneath them . . .

The screen showed a sudden tracery of light. Fusion explosions were speckling the darkness, each one pumping a bundle of X-ray laser rods in the nanosecond before it vaporized them.

Icepicks of the Gods, Knott thought, his stomach muscles drawing in slightly in instinctive sympathy, knowing what the enemy commander must be feeling as the bolts of energy went burning through ablative panels and into the hull frame, searing through conduits and bulkheads, into the sensitive electronic heart of the cruiser, seeking the bottled antihydrogen that would tear the ship apart from the inside. One after another the Speeds dropped their loads.

“Loss of drive energy,” the tac officer said. “She’s shedding hull plating and atmosphere . . . still has hull integrity and basic power systems, though. Fusion generator online, and she’s warming up her A-H bottle for a jump.”

“Is the solution still good?”

“Yes, skipper—we’re going right down their throats, and her ECM and shields are going null .

. . missile approaching detonation envelope . . . three . . . two . . .”

A ball of light expanded across the screen. “Containment failure. Target destroyed.”

“He’s running for it!” Sutton’s wingman shouted.

Now the lower velocity of the crippled Mollie destroyer actually helped it, as it shed momentum and reversed, starting its run for the jump point. That meant running the gauntlet of the Speeds again, but those had used most of their parasite bombs.

“Okay,” Sutton said. “We’ve got to let him escape, but make it convincing—we don’t want him thinking we deliberately let him go.”

The rest of the squadron doubled. A particle beam from a Mollie gunner slammed into Sutton’s wingman and the

Speed exploded into flame and twisting fragments. Sutton cursed bitterly, under his breath.

“Apache, Onion, Penguin,” the squadron leader said, “harry our mark to departure. He sent an aiming pulse at the ship he meant and left it to his men to drive it to the jump point.

From the captain’s chair of the injured destroyer

Fight Temptation Strongly

Second Lieutenant Prayerful Stubbins stared with shock-filled eyes around the ruined bridge.

His forearm had been broken when the ship was hit and he’d gone flying over his own console.

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