Hunter's Quest (Colonial War Book 3) by Richard Tongue

Author:Richard Tongue [Tongue, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-07-04T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

“I’m sorry, sir,” Ibori said, looking up from her console. “We lost all of our telemetry feeds at impact. There’s no way to tell whether the pilot could have survived the strike.” She tapped a control, then said, “However, if he did, it is just possible that he might have managed a survivable landing, especially if he ejected from the ship at the final second using his suit jets.”

“What sort of odds are you suggesting, Ensign?” Fitzroy asked.

“Based on Lieutenant Ortega’s skills as a pilot…,” she began, pausing to look at Hunter, “perhaps one in three. Maybe less. And that’s assuming that he lived through the initial strike.”

“Thank you, Ensign,” Hunter said. “Keep monitoring all channels.”

“Interference is still total from low planetary orbit to the surface, sir, but I think I might be able to break through, given time.” She frowned, then said, “I could launch a probe, sir, on a ballistic trajectory. It’d never survive the impact of landing, but we might learn something of the situation down there when it got close. Even a couple of seconds…”

“There’s no reason to expect that the enemy would give us that sort of time, Ensign,” Hunter said. “Though if you can figure out a way to get a ship through their blockade, I want to know right away.”

“I’ll do my best, sir,” she said, as Hunter moved back to the holodesk, Fitzroy in tow. The rear doors opened, and Riley walked inside, nodding at Hunter as he made his way to the vacant Defense Systems station, Rogers still nervously working the helm, her eyes darting from the viewscreen to her console, to the trajectory plot that showed them racing to safety.

“I’m truly sorry about your friend, sir,” Fitzroy said, “but…”

“I know,” Hunter interrupted. “I shouldn’t have let him go.”

“He should have made it,” Fitzroy said. “I was tracking his course all the way down, and he was executing a perfect series of evasive maneuvers. The most hazardous part of the flight was yet to come, while he was waiting on the surface for the landing team to board. In my opinion, using the sensors on that enemy ship, there was no way for them to successfully take that shot.”

“Meaning that there had to be someone down on the surface.”

“I agree, sir, and I’m afraid that leads me to a rather unhappy thought. We were as good as certain that there was nothing down on the planet. Our sensors blanketed the region surrounding that base thoroughly, and we got some even better readings from both shuttles. There was no sign of any other installation, not even a surface sensor relay.”

“I agree with you,” Hunter said. “That’s not a happy thought.”

“There are other possibilities, of course,” she said, “but I take it then that you agree with me, that the most realistic theory is that one of the landing party is a traitor, working for the enemy. It would have been simple enough for anyone entering the base to have reactivated the sensors and established a tight-beam link with the enemy ship.

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