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Book: Last of the Immortals (The Jessica Keller Chronicles Book 3) by Blaze Ward
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Authors: Blaze Ward
Tags: Space Opera, Artificial intelligence, Space Exploration, Galactic Empire, hard sf, Space Station
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real space. They would probably need a full recalibration at that point, but he was confident his staff could hold the matrix together at least enough to get half a light–year away, if they managed to end up landing in the middle of the Red Admiral’s fleet, firing into the remains of the orbital station. They had that planned as a backup.
There .
Half the nav board went red as the matrix popped, like a soap bubble on a child’s finger.
CR–264 was back into realspace.
And now, the stupid part.
“Sensors, go wide,” he called into the comm. “I don’t care who they are, I just want to make sure we don’t hit them at this speed.”
“Gotcha,” someone on the gun deck called. They were all awake and scanning their little area, in addition to what the actual sensor crew was doing.
CR–264 was moving at the sort of speed that would normally get him a very rude talking to from Flight Control. At least until he explained the situation. Then they might shut up. They might not. You never knew with bureaucrats.
He was flying forward at the sort of attack speed that one of Auberon ’s melee fighters might have a hard time matching. That was okay as well. He wasn’t planning to come into this place at a polite speed, anyway. The record books said Station–to–Orbit when measuring records like this. If he did a slingshot longways around the planet, and he would at this speed, no question, it still counted.
After all, he was racing eternity here. Not just every other navigator out there today, but every other one that would be born. Stiff company. Gotta make them look like pikers when they saw his flight time.
“Bridge, gun deck,” a voice called. “No Imperials are identifying themselves right now. The station is intact, near as I can tell. Orbital Control is pissed.”
“They’ll get over it,” Kigali replied, half under his breath. “Comm, tell Orbital Control to bother someone else and to assign us an orbital approach to Ballard Flight Station so we can get close enough to send a shuttle over. Then find someone in charge over there and get me a private channel with full military scramble enabled.”
No point in starting a complete civilian panic. At least not yet. That would happen in a few hours, when the news got out. Right now, he needed the senior Command Centurion in charge over there activating all those silly contingency plans they had never expected to use.
Hopefully, someone had been keeping them up to date, and even training on them every once in a while. Otherwise, this was going to get very ugly, very quick.
Ξ
Kigali could tell that the man was going to be difficult as soon as he appeared on the comm screen. There was just a look to him. The first words made it obvious.
“This is Command Flight Centurion Timofeh Ariojhutti,” he growled, just short of a bellow. “What the hell do you think you’re doing, flying like that in my space, mister?”
Kigali took a deep breath before responding. That sort of loud hard–ass act probably worked on people that didn’t have to measure up to Jessica Keller on a daily basis. Here, it just made the man look like an amateur.
And Ariojhutti looked like a former fighter jock, that sort of average height starting to spread out around the middle from too much time flying a desk.
“Are we on a secured channel, Command Flight Centurion?” Kigali answered quietly.
“A what? Why?”
Kigali stared at him hard, almost dismissively. It was one thing to act tough. Tomas Kigali wasn’t in the mood to take any shit from some bumpkin in a boring defense slot, protecting a station in the middle of the Republic , even if it was about to become the front lines.
“My name is Command Centurion Tomas Kigali. I have priority orders from the Premier of the Republic, Command Flight Centurion,” Kigali said quietly. He let his anger underline his words. “You can secure this channel, or you can wait until I arrive by shuttle to personally deliver them.
There .
Half the nav board went red as the matrix popped, like a soap bubble on a child’s finger.
CR–264 was back into realspace.
And now, the stupid part.
“Sensors, go wide,” he called into the comm. “I don’t care who they are, I just want to make sure we don’t hit them at this speed.”
“Gotcha,” someone on the gun deck called. They were all awake and scanning their little area, in addition to what the actual sensor crew was doing.
CR–264 was moving at the sort of speed that would normally get him a very rude talking to from Flight Control. At least until he explained the situation. Then they might shut up. They might not. You never knew with bureaucrats.
He was flying forward at the sort of attack speed that one of Auberon ’s melee fighters might have a hard time matching. That was okay as well. He wasn’t planning to come into this place at a polite speed, anyway. The record books said Station–to–Orbit when measuring records like this. If he did a slingshot longways around the planet, and he would at this speed, no question, it still counted.
After all, he was racing eternity here. Not just every other navigator out there today, but every other one that would be born. Stiff company. Gotta make them look like pikers when they saw his flight time.
“Bridge, gun deck,” a voice called. “No Imperials are identifying themselves right now. The station is intact, near as I can tell. Orbital Control is pissed.”
“They’ll get over it,” Kigali replied, half under his breath. “Comm, tell Orbital Control to bother someone else and to assign us an orbital approach to Ballard Flight Station so we can get close enough to send a shuttle over. Then find someone in charge over there and get me a private channel with full military scramble enabled.”
No point in starting a complete civilian panic. At least not yet. That would happen in a few hours, when the news got out. Right now, he needed the senior Command Centurion in charge over there activating all those silly contingency plans they had never expected to use.
Hopefully, someone had been keeping them up to date, and even training on them every once in a while. Otherwise, this was going to get very ugly, very quick.
Ξ
Kigali could tell that the man was going to be difficult as soon as he appeared on the comm screen. There was just a look to him. The first words made it obvious.
“This is Command Flight Centurion Timofeh Ariojhutti,” he growled, just short of a bellow. “What the hell do you think you’re doing, flying like that in my space, mister?”
Kigali took a deep breath before responding. That sort of loud hard–ass act probably worked on people that didn’t have to measure up to Jessica Keller on a daily basis. Here, it just made the man look like an amateur.
And Ariojhutti looked like a former fighter jock, that sort of average height starting to spread out around the middle from too much time flying a desk.
“Are we on a secured channel, Command Flight Centurion?” Kigali answered quietly.
“A what? Why?”
Kigali stared at him hard, almost dismissively. It was one thing to act tough. Tomas Kigali wasn’t in the mood to take any shit from some bumpkin in a boring defense slot, protecting a station in the middle of the Republic , even if it was about to become the front lines.
“My name is Command Centurion Tomas Kigali. I have priority orders from the Premier of the Republic, Command Flight Centurion,” Kigali said quietly. He let his anger underline his words. “You can secure this channel, or you can wait until I arrive by shuttle to personally deliver them.
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