Page 122 (1/2)

“Fast ht torpedoes!”

Bobbie could see theh g The UN ships immediately responded Half of the Martian ships and opened up with their rail guns and point defense cannons The space on the tactical display between the two groups was suddenly filled with yellow-orange dots

“Inco!” Naomi yelled “Six torpedoes on a collision course!”

Half a second later, the torpedoes’ vector and speed information popped up on Bobbie’s PDC control display Holden had been right The skinny Belter was good at this Her reaction tied all six torpedoes for the PDCs, and the ship began to vibrate as they fired in a rapid staccato

“Juice co,” Alex said, and Bobbie felt her couch prick her in half a dozen places Cold pu white-hot She shook her head to clear the threatening tunnel vision while Alex said, “Three … two …”

He never said one The Rocinante s her into her crash couch She remembered at the last second to keep her elbows lined up, and avoided having her arravities

On her threat display, the initial wave of six torpedoes fired at them winked out one by one as the Roci tracked and shot them down More torpedoes were in the air, but now the entire Martian wing had opened up on the Earthers, and the space around the ships had become a confusion of drive tails and detonations Bobbie told the Roci to target anything on an approach vector and shoot at it with the point defenses, leaving it up to Martian engineering and the universe’s good graces

She switched one of the big displays to the forward ca it into aon the battle Ahead of her the sky was filled with bright white flashes of light and expanding clouds of gas as torpedoes detonated The UN ships had decided that the Martians were the real threat, and all six of them had spun to face the enemy ships head-on Bobbie tapped a control to throw a threat overlay onto the video ie, and suddenly the sky was full of ilowing outline on every torpedo and projectile

The Rocinante was co up fast on the UN destroyers, and the thrust dropped to two g “Here we go,” Alex said

Bobbie pulled up the torpedo targeting systeeted the drive cones of two of the ships “Tay,” she said, releasing her first two fish into the water Bright drive trails lit the sky as they streaked off The ready-to-fire indicator went red as the ship reloaded the tubes Bobbie was already selecting the drive cones of the next two UN ships The instant the ready indicator went green, she fired theeted the last two destroyers, then checked on the progress of her first two torpedoes They were both gone, shot down by the destroyers’ aft PDCs A wave of fast-ht hurtled toward the out of the line of fire

It wasn’t enough A yellow at in the cockpit, and a ditone Klaxon sounded

“We’re hit,” Holden said, his voice calht”

As Holden shut down the air system, the sounds of the ship faded until Bobbie could hear only her own breathing and the faint hiss of the 1MC channel on her headset

“Wow,” Amos said over the coed to go right through us without hitting anything that h my room,” the scientist, Prax, said

“Bet that woke you up,” Arin

“I soiled myself,” Prax replied without a hint of humor