Honor Bound

will contact you again once we match velocities.”

“You should consider a career in acting, McKay,” Patel said as the Communications officer cut the connection. “Helm, take us to one g acceleration to the turnover point, then decelerate to match velocities… but make sure we’re not too close.”

“He’s almost there,” Pirelli said, eyeing the sensors. “Yeah, his drive’s shut down.” The fusion flare behind the computer enhanced image of the ship on the viewscreen had disappeared, and they could see the minute stars of maneuvering thrusters firing near the aft of the ship. “He’s slowed to near station-keeping velocity and he’s doing a turnaround. I expect he’s about to place the fusion trigger.”

“Probably launched it already,” McKay said. “He only has a couple minutes left.”

There was the flash of a miniature sun on the viewscreen. “And there it is,” Pirelli said with a nod.

“Drive field deactivate. Fire lasers,” Patel ordered. “Target their drives but just miss.”

“Aye, sir.” The young woman traced a finger on a control screen then tapped it and a crimson line flashed on the viewscreen as the computer simulated the laser pulse that hit just forward of the Protectorate ship’s drives where the armored hull plating was at its thickest, evaporating tons of it in a glowing plume of hot gasses.

And then the Postavshchik was gone. A nothingness in space outlasted her passing by moments and then the stars returned.

“She’s through,” Pirelli said redundantly.

“Station keeping,” Patel ordered. “Ready the emitters to open the gate on my order.”

“Without gravimetic sensors,” McKay mused, “it’ll be tough for them to see us come through, especially if they’re doing a fusion burn. The question is, do we want them to see us come through? On the one hand, if they see us come through behind them, it might spook them into running straight home. On the other hand, if they have a competent captain with some nerve, he’ll realize that we could be following them home and he’ll take us farther away from it.” He looked to Mironov. “Konstantin? What do you think? How will this Medvedev react?”

“I served on his ship once,” Mironov said with a shrug. “He’s smart… but he’s more concerned with his skin than his duty. He’ll go somewhere safe.”

“Helm,” Patel decided, “give him thirty minutes before you open the gate. That’ll give him time to clear it and be on his way to the next one before he sees us come through.”

“Aye, sir,” Sweeney confirmed.

McKay felt a vibration at his belt and looked down to see, with some annoyance, that someone was buzzing his ‘link. He put the ear bud in place and answered, “McKay here,”

Patel glanced back at him with some annoyance, but said nothing. He knew the Admiral didn’t like any private communications on the bridge, but the Admiral knew him well enough to realize that he wouldn’t have taken the call if it wasn’t important.

“McKay, this is Podbyrin,” the former Protectorate Colonel said to him over the communications link. “I’ve been doing as you asked and watching Mironov over the monitors in the auxiliary control room.”

McKay studiously avoided looking at Mironov, who was still strapped into the acceleration couch next to him. “Yes, I understand. Go ahead.”

“Something is…” The Russian struggled for a phrase. “Something is not right about him, McKay. I am watching him and I see that he is too… too comfortable. This is very unnatural for him; he should be more out of place, more nervous. Instead, he looks as if he is on vacation.”

“Mmm-hmm,” McKay replied ambiguously. “So, why do you think that might be?”

“I can only think of two reasons. Either he is playing you… or he’s gone over the edge and he’s mentally unstable. Neither of these are a good thing.”

“Well, I find the former difficult to believe, given our precautions,” McKay said carefully. “As for the latter… we don’t have much choice than to just deal with it. Thanks for letting me know, I’ll get back to you later.”

He ended the call and shrugged an apology to Admiral Patel but his stomach was roiling and his head was pounding. He knew that Podbyrin was right and he’d been thinking the same thing himself: it was too easy. But there was no way Mironov could be a plant, he was certain of that: how the hell would Antonov have known the man would survive and be captured? Which left the possibility that the man was bat-shit insane; that, unfortunately, McKay could readily believe.

I guess all we can do, McKay thought, is hope he’s crazy but not stupid. God, I wish Shannon were here. She’s so much better at reading people than I am.

“All right,” Patel announced finally, “that’s enough time. Helm, open the gate and take us through. I want the drive field reactivated the moment we are through that gate. Tactical, sound battle stations.”

McKay had a knot in his stomach as the wormhole expanded. If they were guessing wrong, they could be jumping right into a fusion missile, with their shields down. They would all be dead before they knew what hit them… or worse, they would see it coming but not have time to do anything about it. The thought of dying didn’t scare him so much as it frustrated him. There was just too much left to do for him to die now.

“Engaging plasma drives,” Sweeny said. “We’re entering the wormhole now…”

Jesus… McKay had been so worried about what they would find on the other side of the gate that he’d forgotten how much he hated transitioning through the damn things. His brain yanked itself back into reality with the whooping of alarm klaxons and his eyes snapped to the viewscreen. Before he could make sense of what the Tactical officer was saying, he could see that the Sheridan had jumped into a binary star system with three gas giants and two terrestrials and he could also see the representation of the Protectorate lighter a light second away from them.

“I think she’s heading for the next gate,” Pirelli said. “She doesn’t seem to have seen us.”

“Make sure she does, Commander Pirelli,” Patel instructed with a predatory grin. “Deactivate drive field and target her forward weapons pods with the Gauss cannon.”

“Aye, sir, targeting weapons pods and firing.”

The ship shuddered ever so slightly as a pair of tungsten darts, each the size of a groundcar, shot out from it at thousands of meters per second. They crossed the distance between the ships in minutes and smashed into the bulbous weapons pod that jutted from the port bow of the lighter. The pod was ripped from its stanchions in a glowing cloud of burning oxygen, floating away with the kinetic energy imparted by the impact.

“Weapons pod destroyed,” Pirelli said with a nod of satisfaction. “Doesn’t seem to be much secondary damage… she still has hull integrity. She’s still firing her drive; I think she’s increasing acceleration.”

“She has to do a turnover soon,” Sweeny said, frowning. “Unless the next gate is still pretty far away.”

“They are never more than a few light-seconds apart,” Mironov corrected him. “He is, I think, going to try to make the transition at high acceleration… he is, what you say…” He exchanged Russian with McKay, then nodded. “He is scared shitless.”

“There it goes!” Pirelli said, pointing at the screen, where the explosion of the fusion trigger was almost swallowed up in the ship’s drive flame. The wormhole entrance barely had time to expand before the Protectorate ship was through it.

Sweeny looked to Admiral Patel. “Do we wait or follow him through, sir?”

“Stay on his ass,” Patel urged. “Re-open the wormhole and take us through now, before he has the chance to think up something clever. I want him with only one option: keep running.”

“Aye, sir,” Sweeny nodded. “Opening the gate.”

McKay tried to control his breathing and relax this time, but the transition was like riding a roller coaster with a first drop infinity deep and he still found himself feeling like his body was turning inside out. He blinked his eyes hard and gripped the arms of his couch, forcing himself back to coherence. He looked up at the viewscreen as it flickered back to life, seeing stars returning to the screen, seeing… was that the drive tube of the Protectorate ship?

Oh shit!

“Activate the drive!” He screamed the order at the same time as Admiral Patel, but then the Protectorate ship’s drive fired; a focused fusion blast ignited less than ten kilometers ahead of them and everything went