Cobra Outlaw - eARC Read Online Free PDF Page A

Flicker nets were the Troft weapon of choice for bringing ships out of hyperspace: fields of low-level but carefully tuned energy ripples that could stretch up to two million kilometers on an edge and could yank a ship out of hyperspace and scramble its drive sequencing. Until the drive was recalibrated, the victim would be trapped in space-normal, potentially easy prey for the spider ships that typically patrolled such nets.
    “It could have been a spontaneous decalibration,” Garrett said into his musings. “That does still happen.”
    “Not usually to three of the rotators at the same time,” Barrington pointed out. “Do we know which Trofts live around here?”
    “According to Chintawa’s maps, this whole region is unclaimed territory,” Garrett said. “That’s presumably why Ukuthi sent us this along this route in the first place.”
    “Presumably,” Barrington echoed the caveat, twitching his eyelid again to access the navigational section of the data stream. Despite his suspicions about Ukuthi’s intentions and motivations, he’d given orders to stay on the Troft’s course, and the readout indicated that the Dorian had indeed maintained that heading.
    Which meant that if the flicker net had been set as a trap, the perpetrators had made a pretty sloppy job of it. Misaligning it so badly that the Dorian merely clipped the edge did nothing but alert them to the net’s presence without even slowing their progress.
    Unless the Dorian wasn’t their target.
    “Course check,” he called toward the helm. “Vector from Aventine to Ukuthi’s coordinates. Does it pass through the flicker net region?”
    “Checking, Captain,” the helmsman said. “Tentatively confirmed, sir.”
    “Tentatively?” Barrington echoed.
    “We don’t actually know how the net is laid out,” Garrett pointed out. “That impact could have been against any of the edges.”
    He was right, of course. And the net’s positioning would make all the difference as to whether or not a ship coming from the Cobra Worlds capital would be captured, inconvenienced, or missed completely.
    But the fact that the projected course came anywhere near the net was both telling and ominous. “Let’s find out which, then, shall we?” he said. “Helm: bring us around one-eighty. Make break-out thirty light-seconds this side of our contact with the net. Full stealth mode.”
    “Break-out thirty light-seconds from net, aye,” the helmsman acknowledged. “Stealth mode, aye.”
    Garrett cleared his throat. “A comment, Commander?” Barrington asked quietly.
    “It’s occurred to me, sir, that if we stay here long enough to map out the net we’re going to be late to our rendezvous,” Garrett pointed out. “If the net has nothing to do with us, Ukuthi may decide we’re not coming and leave. If that happens, and if the coordinates he gave us aren’t Qasama, this whole exercise will have been for nothing.”
    “True enough,” Barrington said. “And I completely agree. This net almost certainly has nothing to do with us.”
    Garrett frowned. “But then—?”
    “But I think it has everything to do with the rest of the task force,” Barrington continued. “Specifically, with whomever Commodore Santores decides to send to Ukuthi’s rendezvous to meet us.”
    “If he sends anyone at all.”
    “Oh, he’ll send someone,” Barrington said grimly. “Even if it’s just the Hermes with fresh orders. On the other hand, if he suspects we’re walking into a trap he could send the Algonquin to back us up, or even decide to come himself with the Megalith . If he does either, whoever’s pulling the strings on this will have succeeded in completely splitting up the task force.”
    “One each at Aventine, the net, and with Ukuthi,” Garrett said, frowning a little harder. “Does that make Ukuthi—? No. He wouldn’t be involved, would he?”
    “Not with that particular trap,” Barrington said. “If he was, he would have given us a course