Leviathan Wakes (Expanse 1)

He felt he now had the counterargument.

To keep his mind busy, he ran through the plan again. When they were practically close enough to spit on Thoth station, Alex would fire up the reactor and do a braking maneuver at nearly ten g’s. The Guy Molinari would begin spraying radio static and laser clutter at the station to confuse its targeting package for the few moments the Roci would need to come around on an attack vector. The Roci would engage the station’s defenses, disabling anything that could hurt the Molinari, while the cargo ship moved in to breach the station’s hull and drop off her assault troops.

There were any number of things wrong with this plan.

If the station decided to fire early, just in case, the Roci could die before the fight even started. If the station’s targeting system could cut the Molinari’s static and laser clutter, they might begin firing while the Roci was still getting into position. And even if all that worked perfectly, there was still the assault team, cutting their way into the station and fighting corridor to corridor to the nerve center to take control. Even the inner planets’ best marines were terrified of breaching actions, and for good reason. Moving through unfamiliar metal hallways without cover while the enemy ambushed you at every intersection was a good way to get a lot of people killed. In training simulations back in the Earth navy, Holden had never seen the marines do better than 60 percent casualties. And these weren’t inner planet marines with years of training and state-of-the-art equipment. They were OPA cowboys with whatever gear they could scrape together at the last minute.

But even that wasn’t what really worried Holden.

What really worried him was the large, slightly-warmer-than-space area just a few dozen meters above Thoth station. The Molinari had spotted it and warned them before cutting them loose. Having seen the stealth ships before, no one on the Roci doubted that this was another one.

Fighting the station would be bad enough, even up close, where most of the station’s advantages were lost. But Holden didn’t look forward to dodging torpedo fire from a missile frigate at the same time. Alex had assured him that if they could get in close enough to the station, they could keep the frigate from firing at them for fear of damaging Thoth, and that the Roci’s greater maneuverability would make it more than a match for the larger and more heavily armed ship. The stealth frigates were a strategic weapon, he’d said, not a tactical one. Holden hadn’t said, Then why do they have one here?

Holden moved to glance down at his wrist, then snorted with frustration in the pitch black of the ops deck. His suit was powered down, chronometers and lights both. The only system on in his suit was air circulation, and that was strictly mechanical. If something got fouled up with it, no little warning lights would come on; he’d just choke and die.

He glanced around the dark room and said, “Come on, how much longer?”

As if in answer, lights began flickering on through the cabin. There was a burst of static in his helmet; then Alex’s drawling voice said, “Internal comms online.”

Holden began flipping switches to bring the rest of the systems back up.

“Reactor,” he said.

“Two minutes,” Amos replied from the engine room.

“Main computer.”

“Thirty seconds to reboot,” Naomi said, and waved at him from across the ops deck. The lights had come up enough for them to see each other.

“Weps?”

Alex laughed with something like genuine glee over the comm.

“Weapons are coming online,” he said. “As soon as Naomi gives me back the targeting comp, we’ll be cocked, locked, and ready to rock.”

Hearing everyone check in after the long and silent darkness of their approach reassured him. Being able to look across the room and see Naomi working at her tasks eased a dread he hadn’t even realized he’d been feeling.

“Targeting should be up now,” Naomi said.

“Roger that,” Alex replied. “Scopes are up. Radar, up. Ladar, up—Shit, Naomi, you seeing this?”

“I see it,” Naomi said. “Captain, getting engine signatures from the stealth ship. They’re powering up too.”

“We expected that,” Holden said. “Everyone stay on task.”

“One minute,” Amos said.

Holden turned on his console and pulled up his tactical display. In the scope, Thoth Station turned in a lazy circle while the slightly warm spot above it got hot enough to resolve a rough hull outline.

“Alex, that doesn’t look like the last frigate,” Holden said. “Does the Roci recognize it yet?”

“Not yet, Cap, but she’s workin’ on it.”

“Thirty seconds,” Amos said.

“Getting ladar searches from the station,” Naomi said. “Broadcasting chatter.”

Holden watched on his screen as Naomi tried to match the wavelength the station was using to target them, and began spraying the station with their own laser comm array to confuse the returns.

“Fifteen seconds,” Amos said.

“Okay, buckle up, kids,” Alex said. “Here comes the juice.”

Even before Alex had finished saying it, Holden felt a dozen pinpricks as his chair pumped him full of drugs to keep him alive during the coming deceleration. His skin went tight and hot, and his balls crawled up into his belly. Alex seemed to be speaking in slow motion.

“Five… four… three… two… ”

He never said one. Instead, a thousand pounds sat on Holden’s chest and rumbled like a laughing giant as the Roci’s engine slammed on the brakes at ten g’s. Holden thought he could actually feel his lungs scraping the inside of his rib cage as his chest did its best to collapse. But the chair pulled him into a soft gel-filled embrace, and the drugs kept his heart beating and his brain processing. He didn’t black out. If the high-g maneuvering killed him, he’d be wide awake and lucid for the entire thing.

His helmet filled with the sound of gurgling and labored breathing, only some of which was his own. Amos managed part of a curse before his jaw was clamped shut. Holden couldn’t hear the Roci shuddering with the strain of her course change, but he could feel it through the seat. She was tough. Tougher than any of them. They’d be long dead before the ship pulled enough g’s to hurt itself.

When relief came, it came so suddenly that Holden almost vomited. The drugs in his system stopped that too. He took a deep breath and the cartilage of his sternum clicked painfully back into place.