Were already up? Wait, why had we been cruising through the Gamma Layer with the shields up? Normally we’d power down the main deflector array after leaving the Beta Layer, and just leave up the little navigational deflector that kept microscopic space debris from hitting the ship. Had the captain suspected we might be attacked here?
A salvo of snowflake rounds slammed into the shield. Three tiny beads of osmium traveling at nearly the speed of light, that our attacker had probably fired at the same time they started the missile launch. At 0.98C they were moving way too fast to be stopped by the Square Deal’s shields, which would only slow them by a few hundred kilometers per second. One shot deflected off the angled manipulator field, its course changed just enough to miss the ship. But the other two punched through to explode against her armor.
Hurriedly, I linked in to the rest of the ship’s combat information center. I had full access to the damage control display, and I could at least get activity readouts from fire control, drone ops and navigation.
Damage control showed one shield emitter out of action, a radar panel wrecked and a couple of exterior repair drones destroyed. Well, that wasn’t too critical, and the battle status display showed the plasma shields were already deploying. Another thirty seconds and we’d have a layer of ionized gas surrounding the deflector shield, six hundred meters out from the ship’s hull. Once it formed relativistic slugs would just explode against the plasma barrier, turning a few milligrams of metal moving at close to light speed into a fireball of hot gas moving at less than a thousand kps. That was something the deflectors would actually stop.
So they might get another volley or two of snowflake rounds off, but they weren’t going to cripple the ship with their mass drivers. The salvo of three hundred anti-ship missiles that was hurtling towards us at a hundred and forty gravities would do a lot more damage, though. We didn’t have any interceptor drones deployed, and the point defense lasers wouldn’t get them all before they reached attack distance. The swarm of attack drones following them at a more leisurely ninety gravities would be even worse, although if Chief West was on the ball we could pick some of them off with missiles and mass drivers before they got in range.
Naoko commed me. “Alice? Are you alright?”
“I’m fine, Naoko. What can I do?”
“Get Mr. Desh back to his cabin,” she ordered. “He was down in the vehicle bay breaking down that transporter, and his cabin is much better protected. Once he’s under cover you can report to Mina, and assist with damage control from the aft fabricator bay.”
“Aye aye, ma’am. On my way.”
A second volley of mass driver rounds tore through our shields, and another emitter went red on the damage control display. But the Square Deal was starting to spin, turning her armored starboard side towards the enemy and hiding our vulnerable fusion drives. The crew status display showed Captain Sokol and the first mate were both on the bridge, and they hadn’t been surprised at all. They’d handle this. I just had to do my part.
I mapped out the fastest route to the vehicle bay, and dove out of the cargo container into a sprint.
“Emla, I want you to secure the crates and seal up that container, then get out of the cargo hold and head for the aft fabricator bay. I’m sending you a map now. I’m going to be doing damage control, and I want you to help with the fabrication side of that. You know how to run an industrial fabricator, right?”
“Of course, Alice. I’m sealing up crates now. I’ll be done in a minute.”
With luck she’d make it out of that hold before the missile strike hit. That was all I could do for her right now.
Mr. Desh was still in the vehicle bay, and he didn’t answer my com. Didn’t he hear the claxons? Well, my training classes had told me to assume passengers will act like complete idiots in an emergency. He’d probably waste time trying to ask what was going on, and then we’d both be standing in that bay right next to the ship’s hull when the missiles hit. No, I’d have to just grab him and run.
I dove into a lift shaft and signaled the emergency controls. A lift field threw me down the shaft at fifteen gravities, and then reversed itself to catch me as I reached the bottom deck. The hatch opened for me as I approached, and I tumbled through it. Down the hall, through a ready room and another short hall, and I’d be at my destination.
The last hatch opened just as I started towards it, and a lumbering humanoid bot holding a huge gun in its hands stepped through.
I was so surprised I just stared at it like an idiot for five or six milliseconds. What the heck was an armed bot doing wandering around down here? It wasn’t one of Chief West’s warbots, those were all high-end military models. This was just a cargo handling bot, which was why it needed to carry a weapon instead of having it built in. Were we being boarded? No, surely if the enemy had figured out some clever way to get bots on our hull they would have used something more professional.
Unfortunately bots have fast reflexes, and they aren’t really smart enough to be surprised. The barrel of that giant mass driver rifle started to come up, and I realized it was about to shoot me. With a weapon that was obviously meant for punching holes in warbots. The piddly bit of armor on my space suit wasn’t going to save me from that, and I’d left my new pistol back in my cabin like an idiot. What was I going to do?
The aiming point of the bot’s gun was a bright red line in my awareness. I twisted around it, bouncing off the walls and ceiling, trying to avoid it. Closer. I’d have to get my hands on this thing before it could line up a shot.
THOOOM!
The sound of the gun was deafening in the enclosed space. It blew a gaping hole in the bulkhead behind me, and tore a chunk out of the machinery on the other side. Why the heck was this thing shooting when it was going to miss? Was I actually moving fast enough to confuse its targeting software? Oh, right, civilian bot. Was someone controlling it remotely, or had they cobbled together some kind of cruddy improvised combat software for it?
Either way, it gave me hope that I wasn’t about to get my head blown off.
There was a second bot behind the first, and a clutter of noise that said there were more of them I couldn’t see. But my frantic modeling had found a workable plan.
I hit the floor in a tight roll that got me across the last meter and a half to the bot, and sprang up to ram my shoulder into the bottom of the gun. At that angle the impact popped the handle right out of the bot’s grip.
It was still trying to decide how to react when I kicked off its chest, sending myself flying up and away from it. My foot hooked the carrying handle on the top of the gun and pulled, setting it on course to land right in my hands as a tweak of my suit’s thrusters spun me around. Jeez, this gun was heavier than I was. I wrapped my legs around the stock, and got my hand on the trigger just as the barrel swung where I wanted it.