Reliant (The Mythrar War Book 3) Read online

  Contents

  Title

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Intrepid

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Intrepid

  End of Book Shit

  About the Author

  More Reading

  Reliant

  The Mythrar War Series

  Book Three

  Luke Simms

  Douglas Wayne

  RELIANT

  THE MYTHRAR WAR SERIES

  BOOK THREE

  Luke Simms

  Douglas Wayne

  Copyright © 2017 by Luke Simms and Douglas Wayne. All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, businesses, events or locales is purely coincidental. Reproduction in whole or part of this publication without express written consent is strictly prohibited.

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  Chapter One

  Bellan Sector

  Bridge, NECS Jefferson

  Captain Adam Jones' stomach churned as he paced the bridge. He'd hoped to walk off the jitters, but standing only seemed to make it worse. Anything was better than staring at the tactical display on his console. He even insisted the main viewscreen be left blank to keep from staring reality in the face.

  Dozens of blue blips peppered the radar next to the Jefferson, the color denoting them as allies. Another few dozen littered the screen at the edge of the display, the color of their enemies. Except they weren't supposed to be enemies. For five centuries, the two factions had been allies and friends. In fact, you had to go back to the eighteen-hundreds to find a recorded case of hostilities between the two.

  But here they sat. Both factions brought the bulk of their fleets to stand guard here, in a nowhere sector between their spaces.

  To make matters worse, the crew echoed his anxiety, but there was nothing he could do to help them. They'd have to deal with it on their own.

  He knew it was a cop-out response, but what else could he do? It wasn't like he could shut down the ship for a group counseling session in the middle of the standoff, could he?

  No. The only way to ease the tension was for the stalemate to end. As much as he hoped that was the case, he knew it was unlikely.

  "Any change on the tactical display?" Jones asked.

  "No, sir. Both sides are still holding formation," Ensign Lisa Thomas, his sensor officer, said.

  Jones nodded. Good. Maybe he could step off the bridge and get some air. Anything to get his mind off the standoff.

  "Since we're in a lull, I'm going to head down to sickbay. See if Doc Davis has something for my stomach issues. Commander Fabik, you have the bridge."

  Jonathan Fabik nodded. "I have the bridge."

  Jones spun and strolled towards the exit. The door opened with a mechanical whir as the klaxons rang out.

  Damnit.

  He stopped.

  "What is it now? Another readiness drill?"

  Admiral Lambert had been putting them through the wringer the last few days. Something about staying on their toes in case tensions grew to a head. While Jones was fond of readiness drills on his own, he was growing tired of them. In fact, if they got out of this mess alive, he intended to ban readiness drills on his ship for at least the next month. Two, if he could get his XO to agree.

  "No, sir," Fabik replied. "Lambert wants us all at the ready in case things go sour."

  "Go sour? What the hell is going on?" He realized he probably should've been watching the screen instead of ignoring the situation. Fabik enabled the screen and confirmed his suspicions.

  The NECS Roosevelt glided towards the EU battle line by itself, having left its usual entourage of the Maine and Phoenix behind. In return, the EUS Drachen was moving to the middle of the field as well. Jones wasn't sure who was on the Drachen, though he suspected some member of the EU leadership was inside.

  "The admirals have scheduled a meeting. Something about trying to ease tensions in the sector."

  It's about time, Jones thought. The two sides had been stationed in Bellan for weeks. Neither side had so much as moved a meter since he arrived in the system, yet both sides had continued building their forces instead of reducing them. Perhaps this was the first step in deescalating tensions between the factions, allowing both sides to return to the fight against the real problem.

  Jones paced the bridge one last time before returning to his station. He sat down at his console and brought up the display. Both ships were moving at a crawl, neither pilot or admiral wanting to outdo the other. Or perhaps they were apprehensive about leaving the protection of their fleets behind.

  An urgent message popped up on his screen, marked for his eyes only. For a moment, he considered taking it in his ready room, but decided against leaving his station.

  My crew has just as much right to know what is going on out here as I do. Damn the Admiralty if they think otherwise.

  Wars were fought with ships and people. His ship and his people were on the front lines, which meant they deserved to know everything he did, consequences be damned.

  The moment his eyes saw the subject line, he immediately decided against it. Some things were best left unknown. Especially reports of traitors in their midst. How much truth there was to the message, he didn't know, but the events of the last few months made him wonder. At least, he had to consider the possibility that someone was manipulating tensions from the outside.

  Jones considered reading the message there but decided his ready room was the better option.

  "Fabik, you have the bridge. I have important matters to attend to. If anything..."

  Before Jones could finish, both the Drachen and the Roosevelt exploded. Seconds later, both sides opened fire.

  Chapter Two

  Bellan Sector

  Bridge, NECS Jefferson

  The viewscreen lit up with the lights from hundreds of smaller explosions as the first wave of rounds tore into the front line of EU ships. Soon, those smaller explosions were replaced by larger ones as the smaller ships in the front ripped apart from the torrent of fire.

  In response, the EU ships unleashed their complements of fighters, filling the screen with the unmistakable smaller blips of their birds. Hundreds of them, no, thousands of them, filled the screen, making it difficult to distinguish clusters of fighters from the larger capital ships.

  The front line of NEC ships wasn't faring any better. In less than thirty seconds, they'd already lost seven ships, with another ten threatening to go critical at any moment.

  The Jefferson rocked as the occasional blast buffeted the ship from a stray torpedo or a burst of gauss cannon fire. Thankfully, the lasers were having trouble penetrating the expanding debris field in front of the ship, though the occasional beam tore into the hull.

  "Captain," Fabik said, "Admiral Warner is ordering us with the forward vanguard. They are making a run at the EU flank."

  "A run at their flank?" Jones questioned. "Is he mad?"

  Fabik shrugged. "I don't believe now is an appropriate time to question his sanity."

  Jones sighed. He was right. "Fine. Ensign Kander, follow the others. Try to maintain firing lanes if possible. I'd like to knock out as many of those ships on the way there as we can."

  The Jefferson swung upward
, avoiding the debris field from the first wave of casualties. Away from the protection of the rest of the fleet, the intensity of the strikes on the ship increased, putting the crew on edge. The sounds of distant explosions could be heard from the lower decks where the ship was taking the brunt of the attack. But the armor modulators and shielding were holding, for now.

  "Sir, incoming transmission from the Seattle. Should I patch it through?" Midshipman Kate Hewitt said from the communications terminal.

  Jones nodded. "Main screen." Soon the battle was replaced with the image of Captain Nicole Davis of the Seattle. It had been years, probably a decade, since he'd seen her last. For all that was worth, she was as beautiful as he remembered, though a little harder. The stresses of constant patrolling and combat vigilance were doing a number on them all.

  "Glad to see you decided to join us," Hewitt said. "Pull along our starboard side, use my ship as a shield while you pound the bastards."

  "You sure she can hold up to that kind of punishment for long?"

  Hewitt laughed. "That's why they gave me the Seattle. They built these heavy cruisers to take a beating. She can handle a lot more than that tin can they stuck you in."

  Jones nodded. "If you’re gonna take the ass kicking for us, I won't complain. Just be ready to pull back if things go wrong."

  "A little late for that, Adam," she replied. "But we'll be OK. Just try to knock a few of them out while we advance. Hewitt, out."

  Jones glanced over at Fabik and nodded. Fabik passed the unsaid orders along the command chain to the crews manning the guns while Ensign Kander moved the ship under the protective canopy of the Seattle.

  Within moments, the viewport lit up with the flares of hundreds of gauss cannon rounds as they streaked towards the EU battle lines, their tracers visible against the backdrop of the ship. Staring at his terminal, he noticed the other large ships were doing the same thing. Each was acting as a shield for the dozens of light cruisers and frigates behind them. The occasional burst of fire made it through their makeshift shield, but otherwise, it was holding up.

  But without protection of their own, the heavy cruisers were taking a pounding. Out in the open, away from the mass of NEC ships, they were an open target to the EU fleet. Better than half the ships on the Bellan Prime side of the battlefield had turned their weapons on the NEC fleet.

  Then, the first of the heavy cruisers exploded from the onslaught. Admiral Warner in the NECS Albuquerque had led the charge into the EU fleet and had taken the brunt of the assault. But even in death, the Albuquerque was a force to be reckoned with. As the first explosions rocked the ship apart at its seams, it unleashed its full complement of fighters. In seconds, three hundred X-81 fighters were in the thick of battle, rocketing across the gap and into the EU fleet. Thousands of others joined them from the rest of the advancing ships.

  The scene was pure chaos. There wasn't a single holo-video in existence that could've recreated the scene playing out in front of Jones' eyes. Not without an enormous budget, anyway. Thousands of blips filled his display, the swirl of red and blue making it impossible to distinguish friend from foe.

  In its final moments, the Albuquerque unleashed hell upon the EU front lines. The combined might of two dozen laser batteries and twice as many cannons ripped into the EU fleet, leaving death and destruction in its wake. And as if the crew had sensed the ship’s imminent demise, the ship turned into the EU fleet and away from the vanguard.

  Jones winced as the viewscreen glowed brightly as it struggled to adjust to the oversaturation of the explosion. When the screen returned to normal, the Albuquerque was gone. The only remnants of the once magnificent ship were listing away from the core and into the void.

  Without the Albuquerque to take the brunt of the assault, the Seattle was next. Jones' heart sank as he watched Davis's ship take the pounding in return. He couldn't let her die like that. Not taking a bullet for him.

  "Ensign, swing the ship underneath the Seattle. Let's see if we can give her a break."

  "Sir, the ship can't handle that type of assault. We need the cover of that ship."

  "And she needed the protection from the Albuquerque, and it's gone. If we don't do something, she'll be next. Once the rest of the heavy cruisers are gone, who do you think is next?" When Fabik didn't answer, he continued. "My order stands, Ensign."

  To her credit, Kander had already begun making the swing before he gave the order. At least some people were good at taking orders.

  Without warning, Captain Davis' face appeared on the viewscreen. She looked angry. No, she was angry. He'd seen that expression on her face before. A lifetime ago, it seemed.

  "What the hell are you doing, Jones? You don't stand a chance out there."

  "Neither do you," he replied. "Just trying to relieve pressure from your ship, give your shielding time to recover. That's all."

  "I appreciate your concern, Captain. But I assure you my ship can handle it. If you want to relieve pressure, take out a few of them. Admiral Warner did a number on the line. Finish…"

  The screen cut back to a view of the battle in time for him to watch no less than twenty lasers pierce the Seattle's hull. Before he could reestablish the connection with the ship, it exploded.

  Chapter Three

  Bellan Sector

  Bridge, NECS Jefferson

  Large fragments from the Seattle pelted the Jefferson as they passed through the expanding debris field. Smaller explosions littered the smaller pieces as they passed, spots arcing electricity into the void.

  The sight nearly made Jones crumble into his chair. Watching his old friend die like that was almost more than he could take. The only thing keeping him in the moment was the dozens of smaller explosions rocking his ship. He wanted nothing more than to turn the Jefferson around, make for the nearest jump gate, and get the hell out of here. Consequences be damned.

  But it was too late for that option. The only two gates in the sector were heavily guarded. He wouldn't survive long enough to reach the gate on the EU side, and he doubted his superiors would allow him to survive to escape on the NEC side.

  He wasn't sure he'd survive long enough to make it back to the NEC lines. As it was, the forward vanguard had already lost two heavy cruisers, six light cruisers, and ten smaller frigates. The losses brought their total numbers down to under half of what they’d started with.

  Still, the results of the maneuver had proven devastating to the EU, as the Bellan Prime portion of the battlefield was a mess. They'd taken that side of the battlefield, but at a staggering cost.

  Pushing his feelings to the side, Jones pulled up the tactical display on his console and picked targets. He sent the resulting display to Fabik. "Commander, I sent you a list of priority targets. Hit them in the order marked on the report. Perhaps we can draw attention away from the middle of their lines."

  "Trying to give the fleet room to work?"

  Jones shrugged. "At the least, I want to make the bastards pay." What he hadn't told Fabik was the targets were those he'd confirmed were responsible for the destruction of the Seattle. He wanted nothing more than vengeance. Make the bastards who'd killed Davis pay for it with blood. He knew the assault would likely cost his life, and that of his crew, but he pushed the thought aside. The way he saw it, they were all dead anyway. Maybe they'd survive today, but what would be left?

  The winners here today would be losers in the long term, especially if the rumors were true. If the Mythrar had found them and were preparing to move into their space, they'd need every last one of the surviving ships to turn them back. Even then, he doubted it would be enough.

  Fabik punched in the commands on his console, which sent the orders down to the fire crews. Within seconds, the weapons teams had shifted targets and were unloading everything they had into the first ship in the queue.

  Then something remarkable happened. Without the benefit of senior leadership in the forward vanguard, the other ships followed the Jefferson's lead. Before long, every remaining weapon tore into the ship. Jones had expected to destroy one of his targets, maybe two before they returned the favor, but as the first target exploded into a massive fireball that engulfed a nearby ship, he believed he might just fulfill his plans before they fell.