Wolves at the Gate

by Shane Van Aulen

  “Good morning Senior Chief, what can I do for you?” Lt. Collins said looking down at his palm pad but still smiling.

  “I don’t know how you did it sir, but I and some of my people have been temporarily assigned to help you get this old bucket of bolt up to code,” he said shaking his head.

  Mike shrugged, “Just a little luck but I really do need your help.”

  “Right, some of my people and a half-dozen repair droids will be here in a half-hour. So, fill me in on what we can help with and what your needs are because the sooner you’re space worthy and gone, the better,” he said as Collins brought him up to speed on his ship’s status.

  As worked progressed it was clear that even with all the help he now had, there was still no way he was going to be out of here in three days. If he was lucky maybe five days and even then, they would have to make further repairs in route.

  Beside running diagnostics on all of the ship’s systems and doing basic repairs and maintenance they had some glaring problems still facing them. The old bender drives were still being repaired and it seemed like as they fixed one thing another would pop up. During the month that he had worked with him, Mike had never heard Schmidty swear in German as much as he did with those old bender drives.

  Senior Chief Wineburg’s men and women were helping with the life support systems and fixing the feeder for one of the ship’s two torpedo launchers.

  Petty Officer Curtis found an old space radar unit that would fit the Goliad. According to him, it was just sitting in a junk pile over at the space station’s reclamation center. He also found a crate of needed parts sitting in an old storeroom. Collins didn’t even know that he had left the repair ship when he checked in with the good news.

  Mike still had a major problem in that he still didn’t have a main particle turret and was missing two fusion turrets. The old ones were nowhere to be found and according to the senior chief, they were out of any new replacements turrets. He had missile turrets and gauss cannon for anti-missile defense but he really needed those last three energy turrets.

  He kept looking out into the empty holes where his turrets should have been. Opening up his palm pad’s directory he scrolled back looking for an old file that Rufo Cappillo had given him. Finding it, he activated his pad’s holo-projector and reviewed its plans and pictures. Letting out a sigh of relief he went to find the Senior Chief.

  SCPO Wineburg was not happy as he looked through the plans of the refits of the Alamo and Java. Whoever made these changes was either genius or insane. He was thinking insane.

  “You want to take a light cruiser turret and put it on a frigate!” he declared a little louder than Mike would have liked.

  “Look Senior Chief, we’ve done this to four Battle class frigates and its worked out really well. These old ships have plenty of power, the turret housing only needs a few hours of work to enlarge it and reinforce it to handle the greater stress and additional weight load. Throw in a few power relays as buffers and it will work!”

  “I appreciate your enthusiasm, sir but this would be a waste of time and a waste of a perfectly good light cruiser turret,” he rebutted.

  “Here, just take a look,” Mike said making it sound like an order.

  Now pissing off a Senior Chief Petty Officer was like slapping a grizzly bear while wearing bacon underwear because it wasn’t going to be pretty. He knew that but he was this ship’s captain and not some wet behind the ears midshipman or new ensign. When in command take command. Admiral Hope used to say that to him and to the other middies at Harpers Academy and he lived it.

  SCPO Wineburg took the pad and activated the holo-imager projecting the image of the ISS Alamo into the air. It was a picture of the ship after her restorations had been completed. Standing in front of it were a group of men proudly posing for a picture to commemorate the event. Wineburg made a little gasp as he looked at the picture and enhanced the palm pad’s holo-image to its largest projection size.

  “I even went into battle in the Alamo and she kicked the crap out of a pirate armed freighter and drove off a pirate-controlled destroyer escort,” Mike argued not realizing that the Senior Chief wasn’t looking at the ship but at the men standing before her.

  “That’s my brother!” he said easily spotting his sibling’s scowling face and robust figure amongst the other smiling men.

  Mike looked up at the holo-image and nodded, “Yep, that’s Chief Warrant Officer Wineburg,” he agreed and continued, “He wasn’t happy with the refit at first but he did a great job and it all worked out.”

  The Senior Chief closed the file and deactivated it, handing him his palm pad back.

  “I thought you were conning me to help you by telling me my brother was alive and rescued.”

  “Nope, that was the truth,” Mike said a little surprised by the NCO’s statement.

  “Thanks, sir,” Wineburg said almost at a loss for words.

  “Not a problem,” he replied.

  “I’m also sorry to tell you that I’m pretty sure that all of the light cruiser particle turrets are spoken for,” Senior Chief Wineburg said quickly turning away and barking at his people to get a move on. For the next half-hour, he yelled at everyone he saw telling them that he wanted this ship in brand new condition in less than five days.

  Petty Officer Second Class Curtis reported in a little later saying that he found two brand-new, almost frigate sized fusion turrets that were supposed to be used for corvettes. They were in storage over at the space station. He was sure no one would miss them but Mike told him to stay put and wait until he found out if they could have them.

  Speaking to the Senior Chief, he was glad when the old non-com said he’d make a few calls and find out their status. Wineburg was almost polite in his response and Collins thought that they had turned a corner with the level of his support and cooperation.

  An hour later, they were cleared to take the two turrets as no corvettes where scheduled for repair or refit. Mike got six volunteers and headed out to the shuttle bay to grab a cargo shuttle to retrieve his turrets.

  On his way to the bay, he was surprised to see PO3 Dawn Hartman come into the repair bay. The pregnant woman was dressed in work coveralls and was guiding a grav sled that had several plastex containers of tools and parts.

  “What can we do for you, Petty Officer?” Mike asked with a slight grin.

  “Well sir, I’m here to help,” she announced and added, “the next two days are my weekend break.”

  “I don’t think the Chief is going to like that,” he replied imagining the fit Schmidty was going to have.

  “Sir, I might be pregnant but I’m also a great engineer especially when it comes to fusion drives and their power matrixes. From what I hear you could use my kind of help,” she said having spoken to her future husband and finding out that he had his hands full with the ship’s old Bender drives.

  “I’m not arguing and you can tell the Chief that I authorized you to help,” he said not about to turn down any expert help.

  “You are my favorite officer,” she flirted and then continued across the bay.

  Mike hurried his work detail on so they wouldn’t hear any shouts of protest.

  Borrowing a shuttle, they headed over to the station and to the bay where the turrets were stored. When he got there, he found that the turrets had already been moved to a nearby airlock. It seemed that Commander McClune had heard of what was going on and came down with a few crewmen to help. In almost no time at all they had the turrets loaded.

  PO2 Curtis pulled on Mike’s sleeve to get his attention and guided him away from the others.

  “There are four exterior missile pods sitting in crates collecting dust in the same hold as those turrets were stored,” he said thinking that his new captain might be interested in such a discovery.

  Commander McClune appeared right behind them almost out of nowhere.

  “I believe those are replacement missile pods for a corvette,” he said and added, “Mu
ltiple launch models if I remember correctly.”

  “Could they be fitted onto a Battle Class frigate?” he asked innocently.

  McClune smiled at the young officer, “Ship captains always want their ships to fly faster and hit harder.”

  “Yes sir,” Mike agreed with a big smile.

  The station commander nodded, “I think we could mount them with two pods on either side and tie them into your fire control system.”

  “So, we can have them?”

  “Only if I can put them on,” the Commander said looking forward to the idea of adding corvette missile pods to a battle frigate. If it worked it could be done on other old frigates giving them a bigger bite.

  “Yes sir,” Collins said knowing a good deal when he heard one.

  Cmdr. McClune said he’d pack up the pods and come over as soon as he got them loaded on a second shuttle. Mike took his team and turrets and then headed back. As he piloted the cargo shuttle back to the Mastodon he looked across his view screen at the boneyard of salvage ship sitting in the distance from the space station.

  He had been told that any repair team could salvage parts from the Boneyard but he’d also been told by several people that most of the Confederation ships had already been stripped. Using the shuttle’s sensors, he could read that there were dozens of hulks as well as a dozen Karduan ship signatures sitting out there.

  Docking at the repair ship, Mike had his team unload the turrets and then they took them through to the repair bay for installation. The day was getting late and he told his team leaders to close up operations in another hour.

  Commander McClune was sending over the pods and had sent him a message that he’d be there in the morning with a team to mount them after he spent a little time figuring out how to link them into the frigate’s fire control system.

  Seeing that everything was winding down and that his people would be getting chow and then hitting their racks soon he decided he needed to go find a particle turret. Tasking four of the repair droids to follow him he slipped out of the bay.

  Heading back to the cargo shuttle he stored the droids in back and moved to the controls. He then asked for permission to launch and was surprised when he got it without being questioned.

  “Where are we going, sir?” PO2 Curtis asked coming up behind his pilot’s seat.

  Mike frowned back at him, “I don’t remember inviting you along.”

  “Sir, I saw that you were eyeing that field of salvage ships floating out there,” he commented sitting down in the copilot’s seat. “When you left the repair bay with those four droids following behind you I figure you were going back there.”

  “So?”

  “Well sir, you are desperate for a particle turret,” he remarked and continued, “I’m sure you didn’t get that Knight Spur ring for being timid. So, I’m betting that there is no way in hell you are going into combat without a long-range energy weapon.”

  “You are too smart for your own good, Curtis,” Mike stated angling his thrusters and turning the shuttle towards the Boneyard.

  “Well, you got me out of the brig and I’m hoping you can keep me from getting killed,” he said sitting back in the chair and relaxing.

  Mike shook his head and increased speed. He would have like to have gone to chow as well getting a shower and then off to bed but he had no time for that. Out there was a particle turret and he just had to find it.

  Two hours of searching the Boneyard came up with a big fat nothing. Oh, they found several turrets but all of them were so badly damaged it would have taken weeks to rebuild them. Even then it would be more than likely that they would have blown up on their first shots. Mike could just see it, going into battle and his main gun goes boom and takes out half of his own ship.

  One thing did stand out as they moved their shuttle through the row of stripped and broken ships. The Confederations ships were so stripped that they were good for nothing more than metal salvage.

  Travelling to the back rows of the debris field, the shuttle’s sensors picked up twelve very strong ship signatures.

  “I’ve got twelve good hits,” Curtis announced and then added, “Never mind, those are all Karduan wrecks.”

  Mike ignored him and headed towards the Karduan ships. As they got closer the shuttle’s limited sensors were able to tell what they were.

  “What do we have?” Collins asked seeing the ships grow larger on his viewer.

  “I’m reading four Destroyers, three Destroyer Escorts, two Vanguard Sloops, a Companion Destroyer, and two large sections of what looks like a broken Battle Destroyer,” the Petty Officer announced.

  Collins guided his shuttle ever closer and activated the external lights on the shuttle to illuminate the ships as he passed over them. He couldn’t believe it but even with battle damage many of these ships looked in good condition. It even made him wonder if they had surrendered and if the ships had been simply brought here and parked. The Mastodon was easily capable of bringing a ship of this size inside of her bowels. Hell, one of the destroyers looked ready to use.

  This all made him wonder about the Confederation’s doctrine versus the enemies on captured ships. If this had been a Karduan station and all of these ships were Confederation then they would have probably been repaired and manned. Even if it had been the Wolf Squadron or the Wolf’s Den they would have taken those ships, fixed them up and made them theirs. Desperate times, desperate measure or was it just being practical and resourceful?

  It seemed like a waste to just let them float here but there was nothing he could do about that now. You’d need a crew trained on Karduan systems and he was probably the only one in this system that knew how to fly or repair them. That’s is the only human but once more recruiting Blue males was not on the table. These ships would have to wait until he could get world to Admiral Hope or Captain Kirkland.

  Bringing the shuttle about he saw a damaged destroyer that had seen better days. She had clearly put up a bitter fight and her maneuver engines looked trashed but her bender drive seemed to be in good shape. Coming around and angling to the top of the ship he saw several turrets that looked to be ok.

  Maneuvering to the closest airlock he activated the magnetic clamps and attached to the hull and matched locks. There was no gravity or power so it was space suits and a quick power transfer to the airlock’s locking mechanism.

  “Sir, I’m not really all that good in Zero-G,” Curtis confessed.

  “No worries, this is all inside work. Just take it slow, breathe normally and whatever you do don’t throw up in your helmet because you never get that stink out,” he instructed.

  “Got it, no throwing up,” he said as Mike checked his suit and tapped him on the head.

  Behind them, the four droids lined up to follow. They were carrying things like a portable energy generator, a plasma torch, a laser cutter and one had a box of tools they might need. The nice thing about the advanced repair droids was that they could adapt to the task if they had a past similar experience. Taking out a turret, no matter if it was Human or Karduan was very similar.

  Opening the airlock, they entered the ship to find what he expected - no air, no lights, and no gravity.

  Mike knew the deck plans of most Karduan warships and he quickly guided them down the hallway and around the corner to the nearest particle turret. As he floated down the corridor he plotted out in his mind the steps they’d need to follow to take the turret out without damaging it.

  The droids had activated the magnetic soles of their feet and plodded along behind them. Even with four droids, it would still take several hours to remove the turret and he’d eventually have to bring the shuttle around to draw it into its cargo bay.

  Reaching the interior access of turret’s housing he first connected the portable power unit to run a diagnostic. Curtis was still floating nearby, managing to hold it together from being sick while the droids were all waiting for the command to start work.

  A green light flashed on the scanne
r and he looked down at the list of information. This wasn’t a Karduan diagnostic scanner but it could still register if power could be run through the system and if its systems were routing it back. The large particle turret had its own diagnostic monitor which he then activated while still monitoring everything with his hand scanner.

  “Sir, what makes you think this will work on a Confederation vessel?” Curtis asked his question sounding very reasonable.

  “All of our space technology, as well that of the Karduans, came from the ships that were stolen by the Voroosh from the Kazad. So, they all operate on the same power matrixes. I’ve seen human pirate ships bristling with Karduan turrets as well as having worked on several Karduan ships over the last year. Hell, more than half of the Wolf Squadron is made up of captured enemy ships,” he explained as the turret finished its internal diagnostic.

  Mike looked over the data and smiled inside of his helmet.

  “What’s the verdict?” the scrounger asked.

  “We are good to go,” he announced and ordered the droids to get started.

  Collins then grabbed Curtis’ arm and pulled him out of the way and towards the corridor.

  “It will be awhile before we will be needed and I want to check a few things out rather than just sit here or wait in the shuttle,” he said and headed down the corridor toward a manual access tube that would lead to the bridge. Opening the hatch, he floated in and used the rungs to help float up the tube.

  “Where are we going, sir?” Curtis inquired floating behind him as his helmet’s light help show the way ahead.

  “The bridge,” he said and explained, “some Karduan ships were retrofitted with human maser units from captured ships. I just want to check and see if this ship has one. If we had more time, I would check all of the Kardie ships but we just don’t have that kind of time.”

  Reaching the bridge, they floated around scanning with their lights but to their disappointment, the Karduan Destroyer only had a standard space radar unit. Mike went into the Ship Mistress’s quarters that was just off the bridge and found that it looked untouched. Her plants had died in the cold of space but other than that it appeared unsearched and undamaged.