Into the Darkness: Crimson Worlds Refugees I Read Free Page A

stations report ready, Captain.” Yoshi Tanaka sat at the tactical station on the otherwise nearly empty bridge. Akagi normally had twelve officers and two guards in her control center, but Kato had cut his crew to the bone, evacuating all but the most essential personnel. That left Tanaka and the communications officer the only others there.
    His face was twisted into an angry scowl as he stared at the display, watching the enemy move closer. Kato was a veteran of the Third Frontier War, and he’d fought hard in that conflict. He’d lost good friends too. But that war had paled next to the savagery of this one, and nothing matched the intensity of his hatred for the First Imperium. The soulless robots were brutal and relentless in a way no human enemy could be. And the sacrifices this war had demanded made the devastating losses of the Third Frontier War seem light by comparison.
    It only made it worse that he knew his enemies did not feel fear. They didn’t even hate their human enemies, at least not in the way mankind understood the emotion. Their attempts at genocide were logical from their perspective, and not driven by rage or prejudice. They were merely following orders in the truest sense. But Kato hated them—he hated them with all the passions his human emotions could generate. He wanted to kill them, to see them in pain, to watch them overcome with fear as he ignored their pleas for mercy. And the fact that he knew his enemy would never feel the pain or fear he wanted to inflict only drove Kato’s anger. He didn’t know if he believed any of his people would survive, but he was damned sure they were going to dish out some damage.
    “All ships are to fire when ready,” he said, his voice dripping with venom. He stared across the almost silent bridge as the comm officer relayed his order to the thin line of vessels under his command. Sixteen damaged ships was a poor force to stand against the massive array of First Imperium power now approaching, but no one expected his forlorn hope to stop the enemy or even damage them significantly. All they had to do was buy a little time, and if they could manage it, even a few minutes, they could increase the escape margin for their comrades—and for themselves if they were able to evacuate in time.
    His eyes were fixed on the tactical display. The first enemy line, about fifty ships strong, was almost within missile range. Many of the vessels were damaged from the earlier fighting, and some, Kato hoped, were low on ordnance. Behind the initial wave there were others, over a thousand ships in all, including twenty of the massive new design that was already being called the Colossus. The whole fleet had twenty times the firepower needed to destroy every one of Compton’s ships, but Kato wasn’t worried about the massive waves of strength relentlessly approaching. His target was the first line, and in that fight, he knew his people could inflict a toll before they bugged out.
    “All missile launchers…fire. One volley, continuous launches.” He spoke softly, firmly, never taking his eyes off his display. Akagi shook as she flushed the missiles from her external racks. Normally, it took at least fifteen minutes to clear the superstructure from the hull to allow the internal launchers to fire. But Kato had already given his orders, and a few seconds after the missiles launched, the racks that had held them in place were jettisoned immediately, without the careful effort to direct the huge chunks of metal away from the ships. It was a dangerous procedure, and Akagi shook several times as discarded hunks of hyper-steel slammed into her hull. But Kato knew time was his most precious resource, and a concentrated missile volley had the best chance of overwhelming the enemy’s defenses and scoring some kills.
    “Racks cleared, Captain.” Tanaka was staring at his screens as he reported. “We have some hull breeches, lost atmosphere in several sectors, but nothing vital.