Captain.”
“I know,” the captain mumbled.
“Missiles!” the sensor operator called out. “Eight inbound, transferring tracks to tactical!”
“Damn!” the captain swore to himself. “Are we jamming!” he barked, angry at himself for not giving the command earlier.
“I started jamming the moment the new contacts were announced, sir!” the ECO answered, proud of himself for having taken the initiative when he knew his captain had been too busy to remember.
“Good boy!”
“Switching rail guns to point defense mode,” the commander announced from tactical.
There were only eight rail gun batteries left, as three more had been taken out by enemy fire since they had arrived in this unknown region of space. They stopped firing for a moment, while they switched ammo feeds and began firing point defense rounds instead of the standard explosive penetration rounds they usually fired.
“It’s not going to be enough, Sir,” the commander warned.
“Time to impact?”
“Twenty seconds.”
“How long before our torpedoes hit?”
“Ten seconds.”
The captain spun around to face the forward screen, just in time to see the first torpedo detonate, blowing a hole in the massive ship, the image of which by now nearly filled their entire screen. A split second later, there were two more explosions, just aft of the first one, causing multiple secondary explosions.
“Yes!” the captain exclaimed.
“Incoming ordnance!” the commander exclaimed.
Five of the eight missiles made it past the Aurora’s point defense fire. The first one struck the nose at an oblique angle and bounced off without exploding, sending it right up towards the view screen camera causing everyone on the bridge to duck instinctively. The second missile impacted the starboard side of the bow, blowing away a portion of their primary hull. The third and fourth missiles both struck on the underside of the bow, which was more heavily reinforced. And the fifth missile struck the starboard side, just below the shield generation compartment.
Nathan wasn’t sure which, but between the detonations of the missiles and the shock wave from the nuclear detonations of their own torpedoes, they had gotten the living hell knocked out of them.
“The enemy ship is no longer maneuvering sir! But she can still shoot!”
“Pull us up, Lieutenant!” the captain ordered. “Show them our belly as we pass! It’s the strongest part of the hull!”
Nathan pulled the control yoke back, but the ship wasn’t changing course. He quickly double checked his console, only to find that he had lost all control. “Captain! The helm’s not responding!”
“Doctor! Can we jump again?” the captain asked, desperately.
“Not possible! The system is offline!” Doctor Sorenson reported.
“Emergency braking thrusters!” the captain ordered. “Sound Collision Alert!”
Nathan fired the emergency braking thrusters, relief pouring over him that at least they still worked.
On the sides of the bow, emergency braking thrusters fired, burning at full power as they tried to slow the ship. But she was traveling way too fast for them to have much of an effect, as they were designed to be used in docking emergencies, and not at combat velocities.
Throughout the ship, the collision alarm sounded, followed by the computerized voice, “Collision Alert, Collision Alert.”
“Evacuate the forward Sections!” the captain ordered.
Nathan’s eyes ran wildly across his console, looking for something that worked, anything that he could use to steer the ship and avoid a head first dive into the enemy ship’s port side. But there was nothing. The only other functioning system was the docking thrusters, which would not generate enough thrust to turn away in time.
He looked up at the main view screen. The image of the burning enemy ship filled the entire screen now. She had stopped firing, as they were now so close that most of her batteries couldn’t get a decent angle to continue pounding them. There were three holes in her side. One, where the first torpedo detonated, and a second, larger one just aft of the first, probably where the second and third torpedoes had done their damage. The third hole was much smaller, and was back towards the aft end of the ship. It looked like a penetration of some sort.
Nathan looked at the middle hole, the larger one. It looked like they were going to strike just forward of it. Suddenly, he had an idea.
“Time to impact?” the captain asked.
“Five seconds,” the XO answered.
Nathan grabbed the joystick for the docking thrusters and pushed it hard to starboard. It wasn’t much, but the bow inched over just slightly, redirecting them towards the hole.
The captain saw what Nathan was doing and smiled as he put his hand on Nathan’s shoulder. He knew he had picked the right man for the job.
CHAPTER 5
Nathan’s head hurt, really bad. He couldn’t remember it ever hurting this bad before. And his leg, something in his left leg also hurt. He started coughing, the smell of smoke wafting into his lungs as he tried to take in a breath. He tried opening his eyes, but everything started spinning.
Squeezing his eyes shut, he tried to concentrate and stop the spinning. There were noises all about him. Crackles, pops, and fizzles. And there were muffled explosions in the distance. And the moaning, someone was moaning. A woman suddenly screamed, causing Nathan’s eyes to snap open. Again his head began spinning, but not as bad as before. The room was dark, except for a faint glow from the back of the room, and the occasional flashes of blue-white light that coincided with the crackles and pops.
He rolled onto his right side and found he wasn’t laying flat, his feet were lower than his head. For a moment, he couldn’t figure out where he was, until it all started flooding back to him, through the pain, the spinning, and the coughing.
He looked around, realizing he was laying on the long, angled cowling between the backside of the helm console and the bottom of the main view screen, which was dark. I must’ve been thrown over the console.
He could hear the woman who had screamed, sobbing and saying something unintelligible to him, something in another language. He managed to slide off the cowling onto the floor, and crawl between the edge of the helm and the sensor operator’s console. After squeezing between the consoles, he looked to his left and found that the sensor operator was slumped forward, his head crushed by the side console that must’ve torn free and fallen during the collision. A pool of blood was forming below the dead officer, as it ran out of his head and down the console, finally spilling onto the floor below.
Nathan crawled out from between the consoles and onto the floor, coming face to face with Captain Roberts. He was lying on his back, and his right eye was bleeding. His shoulder looked odd, and his uniform was stained with blood on his abdomen. Nathan thought he was breathing, but couldn’t be sure in the poorly lit room.
There was another sound, one that Nathan couldn’t quite identify at first. Then he realized it was the sound of screaming, and yelling, and of weapons fire, coming across an open comm-line somewhere. It occurred to him that somebody ought to be looking into that sound. Someone in command.
He grabbed hold of the seat back at the helm station, using it to pull himself up. He winced in pain as he first put pressure on his left leg. He looked down at his leg, bending over and grabbing his left calf-it was wet, bleeding. He wondered if it was broken.
He looked around through the smoke and haze, looking to see who was in command. The captain was unconscious, probably still alive, but definitely in no condition to command. He looked about for the commander, but could not find him.
Nathan made his way up the step onto the main bridge level and limped around to the back side of the tactical station. Lying on the floor behind the console was Commander Montero. His back was severely burnt, and
