SODIUM:3 Fusion

by Arseneault, Stephen

  As we headed back to the DSim, Red came over our audio implants and directed us towards the lounge. We got word that beers would be on the house and Pop's goofy grin was instantly fully restored. As we sat in the lounge taking in our reward, we rehashed every little element of the day’s events. The talk soon came around to Pop's reactor overload. He had reasoned that if we were doomed anyway, why not do as they had instructed... inflict maximum damage.

  When the thought first occurred to him he was hesitant as our DSim had a real reactor in it. The DSim parameters would not allow it be overloaded in the real world but in sim world we could direct it as we chose. Pop had been unsure that the simulation would respond as he desired. We were happy that it had.

  As a consequence, the Defenders that would be seeing battle in two days were having their safety protocols changed to allow manual overloads. It became a point of pride for our team.

  The following day was spent conquering level-one scenarios. It was somewhat boring, but every once in a while you would get thrown a curve. It kept us on our toes.

  When our free hours arrived we continued with level-one missions. In our overall DSim training we had 12 levels to conquer. The 12 levels had more than 400 scenarios with each one having some level of randomness to it. Rerunning the same scenario would yield a different experience every time.

  On the morning of the first Defender battle we were marched into a chamber area that had high walls. Inside the Battle Room there were numerous holo-displays floating in front of a multitude of Tacticians.

  The crews would interact with their Crew Commander who would be receiving orders from the Battle Planners. The Tacticians would be directing their insights through a prioritization computer that would in turn display before the Battle Planners.

  The whole affair was a complex system designed to give the maximum amount of information to the crews. The Crew Pilot would have the final decision if none was forthcoming from the Crew Commander.

  We were seated in chairs identical to the ones in our DSim. Our handlers then hooked us up. The staff didn’t know if the battle would last two minutes or two days. Once the mission began there would be no breaks for anyone in the room. As I looked around I noticed that everyone who was seated and expected to participate in the mission was also wearing a reclamation suit.

  If the battle ran many hours the handlers could adjust levels of stimulants and nutrients in an attempt to keep everyone fully alert. I imagined that Man could not have ever been more prepared to do battle than we were on that day.

  The Battle Commander came on screen and gave his short but to the point speech. This was it... this was real... this was war. In our observer chairs we had access to every fighter, every station and even the Battle Planners’ operations. With the swipe of a hand we could bring up any perspective that the Battle Room had to offer. I chose the pilot's display for Defender A1.

  The pilot's call sign was Dixie. She was a Southern girl with red hair, bulgy eyes and a freckled face. She may have been a little hard to look at, but within the first few minutes it was easy to see why she was A1. She was decisive and hard core.

  The Battle Commander gave the order and the newest war for Earth was begun. The seven Defenders of squad one taxied out onto the tarmac in unison. The Defenders next all tilted upward and then silently shot off into the air at a 78 degree angle. The seven blurs quickly shrank and disappeared from the ground view.

  The hope of the Battle Planners was that the squad would race up undetected and blast the fighters before they knew what hit them. The only detectable signature they had was the void caused by the BHD.

  Every inch of space had some signal emanating from it... except for the void of a black hole. Since the active skin passed signals through and around the Defender the enemy would have no way of knowing the rest of the ship was there. We hoped that the aliens were not tuned into our BHDs.

  As the Defenders raced towards the first fighter at more than 100,000 kph we were all on edge. Coil guns were loaded and powered on and the command had been given to fire once within optimal distance. As it turned out, the coil gun projectile was best fired from within ten kilometers. It would give the enemy the least amount of time to react and reaction time was critical to the alien fighters.

  When the 10 kilometer mark was reached all seven Defenders fired at once. The 28 high inertia projectiles made their way to the first fighter in under a half second.

  The alien fighter seemed to react instantly and was able to slightly deflect the projectiles while at the same time maneuvering out of the way. As squad one came to within three kilometers the alien ship then fired its own weapon.

  The result was seven ships knocked slightly off their trajectories. Five of the Defenders reacted by moving away from the others, but the closest two were not so lucky. Defender A7 hit A4 from the side with the result being that A4 was chopped in half by A7's BHDs. The exploding reactor of A4 then overwhelmed the active skin of A7. Both craft disintegrated in a matter of nanoseconds.

  Our first shot at the aliens had been a complete failure. The Battle Commander directed the team to regroup behind the Moon. The "Run and Gun" strategy was a disaster.

  The alien fighter did not pursue the Defenders. We were unsure if it was unsure of its own offensive capability, or if it was part of its programming. To date, the alien craft had all been autonomous. We still had no idea of who the alien species were or what they looked like. The fact that their ships were smart only worked to instill fear in us.

  Within minutes after the regrouping, the Battle Commander had a new plan. This time the squad would split and approach from five different angles. They would not come close enough to one another to once again be forced into a collision.

  The squad would wait until the ten kilometer mark before firing and turning hard away. The four guns would also be fired at slightly differing times and in a slight spread pattern. With luck the fighter would move into one of the projectiles.

  At the ten kilometer mark the projectiles were let go. This time the fighter came straight towards one of the Defenders. It took aim with its gravity wave weapon and the result was A3 had four of its five sensor arrays and three rings of the BHD knocked offline.

  One projectile then came close enough to the fighter to knock it spinning. The fighter quickly recovered and turned to pursue the closest Defender. A1 speed away at full throttle and the alien craft soon gave up its chase. The crippled A3 was quickly escorted away by A5. The crew was unharmed but the ship had sustained substantial damage. Round two had still been to the favor of the alien fighter.

  Once A3 was safely away, the remaining four Defenders then again rallied behind the security of the Moon. The Tacticians were busy with their scheming. After 15 minutes of conversations between the crews, commanders and planners a new battle plan was put forth. This time A1 would be going in alone.

  We watched intently, wondering what this new suicide strategy was with only one Defender on the attack. I hoped it would not be a reactor detonation as that would not bode well for the rest of us. No one wanted to be a Kamikaze. If that was to be our new strategy then they should at least limit the crew to a single person. Wasting four lives at a time was not very practical.

  As A1 raced in towards the fighter at near full throttle, I cringed at the thought of what might be coming. At the last second the Defender fired a couple rounds and then veered off and slowed as it sped away. The alien craft quickly pursued.

  As the fighter slowly gained on A1, I wondered why it was not going to full throttle. I soon got my answer. After our day one scenario, one of the technicians evaluating the data had gotten the idea of putting an active skin onto one of the nukes. A1 had dropped the unseen missile on its path away from the alien fighter. It had taken precise timing for the detonation, but the outcome was a complete destruction of the alien fighter. Cheers arose immediately, but then quickly quieted.

  A1 had laid a trap and lured the fighter to its demise. The techs had added a p
ico-reactor to the missile to power its active skin. Once the skin was active there was no communication with the missile so a timer had been preset telling it when to blow. The Tacticians had timed it perfectly.

  Upon destruction of the single alien fighter the four remaining Defenders then headed for home. It was just as well as two of the other alien craft had changed positions and were fast approaching the area.

  Squad one came in hot, slowed at the last second and came to a stop facing straight up. The four craft then tilted to horizontal and moved in perfect formation back into the hangar.

  Even with Ensign Braswell pumping calming agents into my IV the stress of the battle had been enormous. And I was just an observer. The mission had been accomplished, but not until after the loss of eight good crewmen and two valuable Defenders.

  The Battle Planners and Tacticians would be working late into the day trying to discern what had gone right and what had gone devastatingly wrong. The coil guns had been largely ineffective. These new alien fighters had evidently been upgraded since the previous battle 13 years before. I guessed it was only inevitable.

  Whip's dropped nuke strategy had been our only bright spot. We would need better weapons and better tactics if we hoped to have a fighting chance when the full fleet arrived. Two years was not a long time to prepare and the clock was ticking.

  After listening to Command and their staffs arguing for hours we decided it was time for us to get back to our DSim. We weren't learning anything of value watching everyone scratching their heads, pointing fingers and yelling. As we walked out of the Battle Command area I couldn't help but look around at everyone outside. They were all going about their daily chores as if it was just another day.

  I was not quite so happy that I had been invited to watch. I reasoned that sometimes it's better to not know everything. I would have difficulty focusing on anything except how easily we had been beaten in our first encounter. I hoped a few extra scenarios would break me away from the unpleasant thoughts.

  We chose to continue with level-one missions and even though we triumphed over each of them, the previous high spirit of the team had been crushed. Within the week we finished our level-one training and proceeded to level-two. Red was relentless in making sure we knew explicitly the details of every little mistake we made.

  His ears were a constant red, but this time it was from anger not embarrassment. He did not want his crew to make mistakes. For the first time in my life I was taking my new education seriously. I had at least three other people counting on me directly if not the fate of the entire world. The seriousness of it all was humbling.

  Chapter 6

  On our first free day Bigg went looking for his son. He reasoned he might be able to learn some of whatever it was that he was doing and at the same time get in a good visit. Whip had sought the company of one of the Battle Tacticians. She wanted to discuss some of the events from the attack earlier. Specifically, she wanted to talk about potential uses for the active skinned nukes.

  Pop had his handler setup a meeting with two of the engineers who worked on the reactors. It left me to fend for myself. Ensign Braswell was available each and every day, so I asked her to assist me in running scenarios. My focus would be on navigation and maneuvering. I had no interest in fighting without my team by my side.

  We chatted a bit about our lives before our current duties as we walked towards the DSim. She was born and raised in Kansas. Wichita was still a hub for small aircraft manufacturing, it had peaked her interest in flying.

  Unfortunately she had a vision problem in one eye that had kept her out of the pilot’s seat during her still young career in the USAF. When the opening for the USAC came before her, she jumped at the chance. Just before joining the Air Force she had received a PHD in physics. That feat had been accomplished by the age of 22. I marveled at her intelligence and determination.

  I then told her of my days in the High School Band and then of my six years in college to receive a bachelor’s degree in Chemistry. I had spent too much time farting around and not enough focusing on my education.

  My degree was in something that I wasn't even interested in. If not for David Brenner being in the family, I quipped that I would probably be washing dishes at some small town diner. Even though I was not deserving of my current post I was very grateful for the situation.

  When we arrived at the DSim, Red was waiting there to assist. Paige connected me to the ship's systems and Red put together practice scenarios. I spent the day flying, conducting maneuvers and pushing the limits of what the DSim would allow me to do.

  When the day came to an end, Red walked into the crew cabin and put his hand on my shoulder. He told me that if I continued my training with the attitude and yearning for knowledge that I had shown that day, I could easily become one of the top if not "the" top pilot in the Corps.

  As I walked back to my personal quarters, I felt a sense of resolve in what I was doing. It was the first time I remember really having pride in who I was or what I might become. I was a fighter pilot, on a mission to save the world. It was an exciting and yet humbling thought.

  The following morning I couldn't wait to rejoin the team. I hoped they had each had similar experiences on their free day as it would help tremendously in lifting our spirits. Whip was the first to tell of her day. She had been with the Battle Tacticians and had asked questions about the tactics employed. She wanted to know what other methods or weapons Command might have up their sleeves.

  One of the key things she had come back with was that the alien craft had comm systems that functioned similar to ours. In the darkness of space they were limited to the speed of light for their communications just as we were.

  We had captured transmissions from their ships. It was heavily encrypted along with being in a language we couldn't understand. Our cryptologists had worked day and night to crack the codes, but had yet to make any headway.

  When fighting in space where the distances were potentially huge, communications could take minutes if not much longer to reach their target. Whip discussed this fact with Paige during our entire morning break. Paige was giddy having someone to talk physics with. During their discussion I felt lucky that I was able to understand how to tie my own shoes.

  Pop had come back beaming with ideas for reactor upgrades. For now he would be stuck with only modifying his sketches. He had hopes of one day being able to apply those mods to our craft. He was a sharp guy but none of us looked forward to being a guinea pig for his experiments.

  Bigg spent the day with his son Chris. They had been going over repair prospects for Defender A3. The damage had been significant enough that it would be permanently grounded and only used for spare parts. The sensor arrays were shot.

  It would take more time and expense to remove and repair the damaged rings, sensors and their housings than it would to build a new craft. Besides, parts were in high demand.

  I still wondered how they got the craft from the chamber to Regents Field and back. I reasoned that it was possible that Regents was right on top of us. Of course with the speed the Defenders could move at we could also be a thousand kilometers away.

  After getting once again connected to the DSim we were ready to start level-two scenarios. Level two would involve more alien fighters and a few out-of-atmosphere runs. The week was spent running through and conquering level-two. My favorite mission was scenario 2.8. After clearing out a pod of drones we were sent to inspect a warehouse.

  Upon arrival everything looked peaceful. After flying slowly around the warehouse we were attacked by about a thousand alien tripods and several hundred drones at once. The doors and windows of the warehouse flew open and the alien tripods and drones came out like angry ants from an anthill. They were everywhere and we were taking heavy fire.

  The battle lasted an hour before we finally had the alien sims on the defensive. Red then told us that this could possibly be the type of scenario we would be facing when their main fleet arrived.

/>   If the fleet was as big as it appeared, the thousand tripod scenario might have been a minimal effort. Either way, it was more like a video game than a real mission. The one thing that always stuck in the back of my mind was that it still was not live. We would not be at risk of actually dying that day.

  The following day a second real mission had been scheduled. We were again invited to sit in on the effort as we had completed DSim levels one and two without another death. This time they would be going after the one previously damaged alien fighter.

  The fighter had taken up position over Japan. Each of the major cities had a massive battery of coil guns run by the United States. We were unwilling to give up the technology, so agreements had been reached where we would provide the manpower and technology.

  The soil where the battery was located had been deeded to the US for so long as the battery was to be in operation. It was designed to prevent rogue regimes from trying to claim sovereignty over them and take the technology for themselves.

  It was complicated and there were always political complaints, but the peoples of the world were largely happy to have them. It was also the only thing keeping the current set of visitors at bay.

  Real mission two began just as the previous one had. The lost crews and fighters had been replaced and a strategy for the mission had been practiced in the DSims for the previous week.

  The Defender squad was launched and then raced out to a location 100 million kilometers away... almost to the planet Mars. The squad had taken the heading towards their rendezvous point and turned off their BHDs at the half way mark. It had been determined by our Intelligence Corps that the aliens had no way of tracking a Defender when the BHD was off.

  Without the BHD running it was hoped that the Defenders could take up position near Mars and then fire off seven of the active skin nukes in a pattern. The trajectories had been plotted and re-plotted so that the nukes would travel around Mars while using its gravitational pull to slingshot the nukes back towards Earth, and specifically back towards the damaged alien fighter.