is that good sir… I can back calculate from the reflection we just got off the other one though. I’ll also calculate what their incoming velocity would have to have been to be beyond the first sweeps.” His head tilted to an odd angle and he began murmuring to the computer.
GUNNERY ROOM—HUMANIFORM CRUISER EXCELTOR—COMETARY EARTH ORBIT
1408 EST
The long narrow room hung thick with the odor of nervous sweat. General Price found himself pacing back and forth along the rows of “cubes,” each with its own team of two to three operators. Price looked over their shoulders into the displays as if by staring harder he could somehow make an enemy ship appear in one of them. His skin crawled with the sensation that one of the enemy’s locator ports was just outside the wall of the chamber getting ready to position a star-port and blow them all to hell.
Suddenly, with a quiver in his voice, one of the noncoms shouted to Nedcam. “Sarge, I’ve got ‘em! I’ve got ‘em!”
Nedcam bellowed. “Teams one, three, nine, and twenty two! Take splits from Delos! Put some holes in it! It’s gonna jump!”
Price ran to where Delos sat at the number two cube. Delos’ cube showed the long, thin “false color” image of one of these “wormhole ships” and he saw the ring at one end brightly sparkling. The two cubes next to Delos’ immediately came alive with the same image and then began to diverge as their operators took the new ports that they had “located” on Delos’ off at slightly different angles, though still rushing toward the ship. As the cubes’ viewpoints rushed in close, loud booms repeatedly crashed through the room from the big cylinders in the back. The cubes’ displays zoomed back and showed radical changes. The “ship” started to deform and violet “false color” sparks and plumes began spraying out into the surrounding space from several sections.
BRIDGE—KRANE DESTROYER YAITAN—EARTH ORBIT
1415 EST
“Captain, I think Zoaden’s been hit! Their comm-port’s just translocated violently!”
“What? The motherless scum hadn’t shifted? Didn’t they pick up Kinjie’s message?” Jenkoit’s cilia stood on end and his exhalations began to cloud up. What else could possibly go wrong? How could a single humaniform cruiser, even if aided by the retrogressed locals, possibly have destroyed a light carrier and now a destroyer in just a few hours? Sure, there was a lot of luck involved in wormhole warfare, but this was beyond belief! “Locate a rescue port on that comm-port and see if we can bring any of them out. How much longer ‘til we have to re-shift to keep from crashing back into this damned moon?”
“Four hundred seventy five seconds sir.”
“Set the shift on automatic, to go at the last second.”
“Do you still want a bounce-type vertical relaunch sir?”
“Yes! What’d you think, that we were going to run?”
Quietly, “No sir.”
GUNNERY ROOM—KRANE DESTROYER ZOADEN—EARTH ORBIT
1416 EST
Commander Kinjie lay stunned on his side, his left head-hand weaving drunkenly in the air and his right stretched out flaccid on the deck. His relieved joy when the rescue port had blinded everyone by opening in the front of Xajion’s bridge had turned into dismay when, seconds after he ran through the port into Zoaden’s gunnery transport room, the destroyer had been wracked with violent explosions. His carapace had slammed into a bulkhead with stunning force and now he was having great difficulty controlling his neuromuscular system. To his horror, it seemed that all three of his excretory orifices had spilled involuntarily. The slippery mess beneath him was contributing to his difficulty in getting his feet-claws back to supporting him.
A minute passed and Kinjie found his legs had regained sufficient control that he was able to rise unsteadily and begin moving up the passageway toward the bridge. Another clap of thunder
GUNNERY ROOM—HUMANIFORM CRUISER EXCELTOR—COMETARY EARTH ORBIT
1408 EST
The long narrow room hung thick with the odor of nervous sweat. General Price found himself pacing back and forth along the rows of “cubes,” each with its own team of two to three operators. Price looked over their shoulders into the displays as if by staring harder he could somehow make an enemy ship appear in one of them. His skin crawled with the sensation that one of the enemy’s locator ports was just outside the wall of the chamber getting ready to position a star-port and blow them all to hell.
Suddenly, with a quiver in his voice, one of the noncoms shouted to Nedcam. “Sarge, I’ve got ‘em! I’ve got ‘em!”
Nedcam bellowed. “Teams one, three, nine, and twenty two! Take splits from Delos! Put some holes in it! It’s gonna jump!”
Price ran to where Delos sat at the number two cube. Delos’ cube showed the long, thin “false color” image of one of these “wormhole ships” and he saw the ring at one end brightly sparkling. The two cubes next to Delos’ immediately came alive with the same image and then began to diverge as their operators took the new ports that they had “located” on Delos’ off at slightly different angles, though still rushing toward the ship. As the cubes’ viewpoints rushed in close, loud booms repeatedly crashed through the room from the big cylinders in the back. The cubes’ displays zoomed back and showed radical changes. The “ship” started to deform and violet “false color” sparks and plumes began spraying out into the surrounding space from several sections.
BRIDGE—KRANE DESTROYER YAITAN—EARTH ORBIT
1415 EST
“Captain, I think Zoaden’s been hit! Their comm-port’s just translocated violently!”
“What? The motherless scum hadn’t shifted? Didn’t they pick up Kinjie’s message?” Jenkoit’s cilia stood on end and his exhalations began to cloud up. What else could possibly go wrong? How could a single humaniform cruiser, even if aided by the retrogressed locals, possibly have destroyed a light carrier and now a destroyer in just a few hours? Sure, there was a lot of luck involved in wormhole warfare, but this was beyond belief! “Locate a rescue port on that comm-port and see if we can bring any of them out. How much longer ‘til we have to re-shift to keep from crashing back into this damned moon?”
“Four hundred seventy five seconds sir.”
“Set the shift on automatic, to go at the last second.”
“Do you still want a bounce-type vertical relaunch sir?”
“Yes! What’d you think, that we were going to run?”
Quietly, “No sir.”
GUNNERY ROOM—KRANE DESTROYER ZOADEN—EARTH ORBIT
1416 EST
Commander Kinjie lay stunned on his side, his left head-hand weaving drunkenly in the air and his right stretched out flaccid on the deck. His relieved joy when the rescue port had blinded everyone by opening in the front of Xajion’s bridge had turned into dismay when, seconds after he ran through the port into Zoaden’s gunnery transport room, the destroyer had been wracked with violent explosions. His carapace had slammed into a bulkhead with stunning force and now he was having great difficulty controlling his neuromuscular system. To his horror, it seemed that all three of his excretory orifices had spilled involuntarily. The slippery mess beneath him was contributing to his difficulty in getting his feet-claws back to supporting him.
A minute passed and Kinjie found his legs had regained sufficient control that he was able to rise unsteadily and begin moving up the passageway toward the bridge. Another clap of thunder
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