The laser cannon operators fired at the third boat just as it emerged into an area relatively clear of rain. The speedboat disintegrated in a spectacular explosion. Water sizzled into steam as the beam continued for several seconds before being switched off. The chill, wet air was filled with stench of incinerated fiberglass.
Dumb bastards! Tully saluted them silently for their courage, while wishing they’d had the wisdom to select their targets more carefully.
Aguilera and Kralik joined Aille and Yaut at the rail, both armed. Tully hovered behind their backs, impotent and cursing under his breath. Even if the boats called off their ill-advised attack at this point, affront had already been given. Oppuk would do what he always did, when confronted with human intransigence. He’d make the price so high in terms of the lives of the innocent, that the occupied lands would think long and hard about harboring and giving aid to rebels in the future.
Tully watched with growing dread as the closest escort fired, narrowly missing one of the remaining attackers. A roar indicated the laboring of its engines, then it too turned and headed out toward the open sea. The escort followed. Within two seconds, they’d both disappeared from view.
Aguilera scanned the low-hanging clouds, his face wet with rain and spray. “Is that it?”
“I doubt it,” Tully said. Rebels would not give up so easily, he thought. They had inflicted no real damage yet and would be loathe to have risked so many civilians back on shore for the little they had accomplished out here so far.
“I do not understand how they could have fired upon us at all,” Aille said, his eyes flickering green. “Our scout ships possess highly effective electronic countermeasures against targeting mechanisms. And they should never have been able to get so close without being detected.”
Kralik’s eyes swept the gray-green waves. “The missiles they’re using are low-tech, line-of-sight and wire-guided, so electronic countermeasures wouldn’t work well if at all. And the boats have fiberglass hulls, not metal ones. They planned this out carefully, and came well prepared for the situation. The weather favors them entirely. That was one of the first things we learned, during the conquest. We always fought you Jao in bad weather, if we could, best of all in a heavy rain. Your lasers may be great in space, or under ideal conditions on land. But they’re piss-poor otherwise.”
Yaut’s ears flicked and Tully thought he detected a measure of respect in the fraghta’s stance.
A muffled thwump sounded, then bits of smoldering fiberglass and metal were falling with the rain to litter the Samsumaru’s deck. Kralik ducked under cover and Tully hurried after him.
Kralik’s gray eyes narrowed. “That’s two,” he said bleakly. “Maybe the remaining boats will take the hint and sod off.”
But they wouldn’t, Tully thought. They had worked up the nerve to do this and by all that was holy, they would see it done or die trying, most likely the latter. A grim smile twisted his lips so that he had to turn away. He almost wouldn’t mind dying on this bucket of bolts at that, if these poor misguided bastards could send Governor Oppuk to the bottom with him.
Then he had to shake his head—drown a Jao? Like that was going to happen.
The three manning the laser mount were craning their stubby Jao necks, trying to spot the remaining powerboats while the trawler heeled across the waves and began to pick up speed. Below, on the flensing deck, the whale had been opened, then abandoned only partially butchered, as the crew had to tend to the business of getting under way. The hot reek of blood and entrails filled the air.
An escort came across their bow and disappeared into the clouds again. Tully wiped his face off with the back of his hand, hoping the action was over for now.
Caitlin Stockwell peered up from the stairwell. “What was it?” she asked, her face white as marble.
“Rebels, most likely,” he told her, “but I think—”
“Caitlin, get below!” Kralik said. “There’s still two left somewhere out there! They could come back any second!”