Emerald Flight: “Star Wing” (continued)

The smaller cameras on the sensor drone, compared to those normally available from ship, made the alien destroyers appear even more menacing that they had before. Bright flares glowed as the enemy vessels fired, with two bolts detonating uncomfortably close to the drone. Neither of those, Hawkes suspected, had been deliberately aimed at the sensor drone, as it still remained too far out of range to be reasonably threatening.

“Lieutenant,” Devereux said, watching the main screens intently. “Can you adjust the angle more to port? See if you can keep at least one of the cameras tracking on the Star Wing’s movements.”

It took Hawkes only a moment to realize that the Captain was addressing Gho at the Science station.

“Yes, Captain,” Gho replied. “I’ll see what I can do.”

Hawkes glanced covertly as the young Science officer worked at her console. The Captain’s request was not beyond the capabilities of the drone, but it did require some expert knowledge of its functions in order to achieve it. He was prepared at assist Gho, if necessary, but would not intrude until it was evident that his support was needed.

“There!” Pyrafox called out, pointing toward the leftmost screen.

“Enhance that,” Devereux ordered.

The image changed. The small white speck that had been the Star Wing now enlarged to show her clearly. She sped between the two massive vessels, staying just ahead of the incoming fire, and dodging blasts as they tried to track her position. It took Hawkes a moment to reorient himself and then to realize that the Star Wing was deliberately directing the enemy weapons fire ahead of the Emerald Flight, making its passage between the two enormous vessels relatively clear of incoming fire. Once the Star Wing moved back toward open space, though, the alien ships would be freed from their constraint of damaging their own vessels and able to focus solely on her destruction.

Hawkes adjusted his targeting strategy accordingly, trying to provide her with more covering fire. The ship’s weapons systems were slow to respond, a result of the severe damage they had suffered.

“Lieutenant!” Devereux spun to face him and then stopped when she saw that he had already anticipated her orders.

Hawkes managed to coax three wide, high-yield bursts from the portside forward emitters before they stopped responding. He switched to the starboard weapons, but the sustained bursts from the enemy visual kept blinding the already crippled sensors, making it difficult for him to determine accurate firing solutions.

“Captain,” Gho called out. “I’m reading a huge buildups in the enemy vessel weapon’s systems.”

They’re not holding back any more, Hawkes realized.

He tried to divert more power into the weapons systems, willing them to a faster response time. The portside forward power indicators remained dark. Those on the starboard side were down below fifty percent of capacity. The portside aft indicators oscillated between nearly depleted and showing a seventy percent charge.

Probably one shot at best from those, he considered, holding that one chance in reserve.

“Torpedoes are authorized,” Devereux called to him. “Full payload.”

Hawkes quickly checked their loaded inventory. There was one torpedo armed and loaded in two of the starboard bays. All of the rest were either empty or offline. There might be no time to try to fire any of them manually.

“Firing,” he acknowledged, and pressed the controls.