Laws of Ancidium (Savage Stars Book 5) by Anthony James

Author:Anthony James [James, Anthony]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-10-05T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fifteen

Intending to make his first effort a gentle tester, Recker was surprised by the Indarox’s response to the controls. He knew the interstellar carried plenty of ternium modules, yet he’d still expected it to fly more like a shuttle than a warship. Consequently, Recker misjudged. The propulsion made a sound like a hundred freight trains passing in the near-distance and the Indarox accelerated savagely, brushing aside dozens of Meklon shuttles as it surged towards the solid bars ahead.

“Oh shit,” said Burner.

The interstellar crunched nose first into the far end of the cage. With an eye on the sensor feeds, Recker saw the armour plates compress and buckle. A few million tons of alloy broke away and, without gravity to affect them, they bounced off the bars and started drifting within the cage.

A second later, the wave of impact energy coursed through the bridge with a depth of vibration that made Recker’s muscles feel like they’d been turned to jelly and made his head think it had been caught inside a hammer-struck church bell. His thoughts remained scrambled for long moments, but his hands instinctively piloted the spaceship backwards from the cage bars.

“Let’s take a look,” said Recker, ignoring the pain in his skull.

“No rupture,” said Burner weakly. “But the front of the cage is bowed out.”

“Not as much as I’d like,” said Recker. “Time for another try.”

He didn’t give the crew time to object. The Empiron-1 mesh deflector activated for a fifth time and Recker had a strong suspicion that would be the last one until the first module recharged.

“Hold tight,” he ordered, throwing the controls three-quarters of the way along their runners.

Once again, the Indarox smashed against the interior of Empiron-1. The nose section was pushed upwards and more armour broke off.

“We’ve lost half of the forward arrays, sir,” said Burner.

“And we’re not free,” said Recker, holding as tightly to the controls as he could. The shockwave came and the tension in his muscles allowed him to resist the worst of it.

“Third time lucky,” said Aston.

“The seventh ship arrived, sir,” said Eastwood.

“I’ve added it to the tactical,” said Larson a moment later. “It’s half a million klicks out - a big one.”

A mesh deflector activated and a warning on Recker’s console informed him this one had been generated by the Indarox. With his face set, he hurled the Indarox into the bars again. Many of the narrower beams snapped like twigs, but the thickest girders were only bent. The sensors highlighted silvery patterns of tiny stress fractures, but not enough for the bars to break.

“Again,” he said, through teeth gritted against the shockwave.

“A bunch of amber warning lights appeared, sir,” said Eastwood.

“Best get your spanner out.”

This time, Recker piloted the Indarox as far back as the available space allowed. A second misjudgement resulted in a collision with the flat slab at the rear of the cage, though at such a low speed that no damage resulted. Even so, he rebuked himself for his carelessness.

The mesh deflector activated again and the stark white of plasma explosions cast a harsh glow on the inside of Empiron-1.

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