The Garden - Melissa Scott [98]
"What's our next move?" he called, not taking his eyes from the displays.
"What your captain did," Grayrose answered. "We have torpedoes, but we must weaken the shields first. Though she has damaged the flagship for us."
Paris nodded, seeing the way the Andirrim craft seemed to lurch against the starscape. The shuttles'
fire was concentrated on the lower stern, brighter along the edges, the flare-back paling where the shields were weaker. Then new lights sparked in the sensor display, dots as blue as the Andirrim ships, and an instant later a silver of metal caught the reflected light of a phaser blast, outlining a needle-shaped orbiter against the starscape. "Grayrose! The Andirrim have launched fighters of their own."
"To be expected," the Kirse answered, but Paris thought her voice was grim. "I'm increasing shields."
An indicator moved on one of the circular boards, a green column sliding up to meet a yellow line. "You're on a yellow line," Paris reported, and wished he knew more about the Kirse systems. Most of it he could guess from Federation analogues, but their color use went against human convention.
"At maximum, then," Grayrose said.
"Right," Paris swung in his chair, scanning the display and the stars beyond it, and then grabbed for the weapon's controller as the first pair of Andirrim fighters swung toward them. With his free hand, he stabbed the tracking indicator keys-another Kirse system that had no human analogue-and then thumbed the tracking device to its highest setting. The bright orange crosshairs popped onto the screen, and he swung the assemblage, trying to line them up on the nearest blue dot. For an instant he had it, and depressed the firing stud, but the Andirrim slipped sideways, turning on its leading edge, and the bolt ba rely clipped the edge of its screen. He swore under his breath, and heard a whistling trill from somewhere in Grayrose's section of the ship.
"We are to go after the main-the flagship," Gray-rose called. "Hold off the fighters if you can, but our main goal is the big ships."
"Right," Paris answered, and hastily checked his
boards again. Luckily, the torpedo release was close to the main phaser controls, and easily recognized. "Arming torpedoes," he said, and shoved each switch forward.
A chime sounded, and a musical phrase echoed from the speakers. "Torpedoes armed," Grayrose translated.
Paris nodded, scanning the dome, and hit the tracking keys again as another pair of fighters swept into range. The shuttle tipped sideways, and he felt the seat under him shudder at the near-miss, but concentrated on the pattern of the blue dots all around him. He fired once, then a second time, and this time saw the Andirrim fighter shatter to flame and debris. Grayrose gave a crowing call, pure and unmistakable delight, and another pink wedge swept past in the dome, followed an instant later by the bright shape of a Kirse shuttle. For an instant, he thought he saw Renehan crouched beneath the dome, but couldn't be sure.
A blue light flared in the corner of his eye, and he swung to face it, automatically bringing the weapon to bear. An Andirrim fighter, a dark diamond against the stars, filled the dome, the blue dot and the ranging crosshairs centered together on its shape, and he fired by instinct, holding the stud down for a long three seconds. Light flared, and then vanished as the Andirrim shields failed, and then the fighter exploded in a great cloud of flame. The shuttle shivered as bits of debris