by A. D. Bloom
Taipan
A.D. Bloom
© 2014
Many thanks to Tom Robidoux for his editorial input.
Thanks to 'Blue Scar' D. for his consulting role.
Thank you to Jimmy Robidoux and the 182nd Airborne.
Cover images and custom models by Whayler.
The author would like to express his appreciation to the New England Air Museum, USS Nautilus (SSN-571), and USS Massachusetts (BB-59), F-15.net, /r/WarshipPorn and her sister subreddit, /r/Warships.
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Epilogue
2165
The War of Alien Aggression has raged for almost a year. The Staas Privateers and the recovering UN fleet have won a handful of victories at Sirius. The tide may finally be turning in Humanity's favor.
Chapter One
The 133rd Fighter Test Squadron flew as far ahead of Hardway as they could without losing comms. It wasn't emissions from Groomsbridge 1618 causing the disruptions. Beyond the Sirius Line, in enemy space, the whole spectrum buzzed with alien jamming. Wherever the Squidies went, they left tiny drones behind them to fill the comms channels with noise.
Jordo was certain the enemy had been here recently. Maybe they were still here, hiding amongst the dozen moons of the banded, fourth planet, waiting to ambush the carrier. He wiped some of the ice crystals from the inside of his cockpit canopy and searched the starry black with the F-151 Bitzer's passive arrays. "Hardway, this is Lancer 1-1. No sign of SCS Taipan. Negative enemy contacts. We're continuing our recon of the fourth planet and its moons." It felt like every malformed hunk of rock and chunk of ice orbiting the gas giant was eyeballing his squadron.
Lancer 1-5, Lt. Telly Lyons, a.k.a. 'Dirty', spiked her maneuvering jets in opposition and rolled her fighter to the other side of the formation. The Staas F-151 exo-atmo interceptor was already an aggressive craft, studded with 140mm cannon and packed with thrusters, but Dirty's white-knuckled hand on the stick made it a piece of pure, flying malice.
Hard and scarred as her little fists were, her voice was smooth like liquor. "If we're here to rendezvous with Taipan then why the hell are they hiding from us?" She fell in beside Lancer 1-3, flying inverted so that their offset cockpits were separated by only a few meters of vacuum.
"If Taipan was easy to find," Holdout said, "she wouldn't last long behind the bloody lines."
"Cut the chatter." They knew better or at least Jordo thought they did. "Maybe Squidy isn't home right now, but you can bet he's listening."
"I kinda' doubt Squidy speaks the English," Paladin added.
"Yeah," Gush said, "Paladin is from Perth and he can barely speak it."
The back of Jordo's neck itched the moment before weapons fire streaked close past the canopy of his F-151, brilliant orange and blindingly bright. He jinked the fighter away from it and called out, "Break, break, break!"
Even more galling than being successfully ambushed was the fact that it wasn't alien fire chasing him and his wingman. Those flashing, vermillion streaks weren't particle streams; they were 140mm autocannon shells. That was friendly fire. "Friendlies! Friendlies! Cease fire!" Jordo shouted it repeatedly on the emergency channel as he spun his fighter around 180 degrees on its maneuvering jets to face the planes shooting at him.
No less than eight Staas F-151 exo-atmospheric interceptors hung on his six o'clock. They loosed rapid-fire shells like a sheet of burning rain that corralled Jordo and his wingman. Holdout and Gusher had picked up a tail as well. Eight more Staas Company fighters herded them with live rounds. "Cease fire!" he shouted. "Cease fire!"
The squadron of Privateer 151s that had ambushed the Lancers all flew with properly coded Staas Company IFF transponders that marked them as the 55th Squadron of the Taipan Air Group. The Hellcats. These were new pilots from the all-volunteer, 90-day-wonder squadrons. It had been barely that long since these nuggets had graduated from Burn's flight school.
The female voice that came over the emergency channel had a lunar drawl for an accent and a raspy texture like fine-grit sandpaper. "Unknown squadron, identify yourselves or we will turn you to Squidy-chow."
"This is Lancer 1-1 of the 133rd Fighter Test Squadron, Hardway Air Group! You can read our transponders so why the hell are you capping off live rounds at my pilots?" He was still flying backwards so that he could see the idiots shooting at them, and as he spat rage into his mic, the owner of the sandpaper voice flew towards him slowly, using only little bursts from her maneuvering jets. The Hellcats' flight leader came closer and closer until she and Jordo faced each other in their cockpits with less than ten meters between them. She squinted at him through her flight helmet's visor. "What the hell are you doing?"
"Right now?" she said. "Right now, this second, I'm getting an up close and personal look at famous J. 'Jordo' Colt." She snorted into her mic and it sounded like static on comms. "I honestly didn't think it would be that easy to cap the storied Lancers. And we had you. No question about it. That was a kill." She sounded just like Burn from the flight school when she said that. "Lancers, you are advised to turn on your six and RTB. Any Squidy bandits at Groomsbridge belong to the Hellcats. Our kills, get it? Go home, Lancers."
Jordo stared down Hellcat 1-1, less than ten meters away and pictured giving his rear thrusters a quick tap. With a little z-axis twist from the maneuvering jets, he'd smash the starboard, bow edge of his hull against the side of her cockpit before she could react and send her spinning. He began to rationalize it. She could use a good scare. His blood got so hot thinking about it that he barely heard the next, surprisingly clear, transmissions from SCS Taipan.
"Hellcats, this is Taipan Control. All 55th Squadron flight elements, RTB immediately. 55th Hellcats, return to base." The call came over the emergency channel, maybe to make sure the Lancers heard it, too.
Hellcat 1-1 kept her eyes locked on Jordo as she spoke. "Copy your last, Taipan. Wilco. 55th will comply." She flipped him off. "Next time, Lancers," she said as her squadron peeled away and blasted off for the limb of the ice moon.
Dirty said, "What the hell was that all about?"
"Save it for later," he told her. "There's Taipan and her four carriers."
"I hope all the new pilots are that much fun." Paladin meant exactly what he said.
The Hellcats made for the battlegroup now breaking the limb of the ice moon, hiding low in the glare. As Taipan and her carriers came out from hiding, a dozen interceptor flights were currently launching or landing. Each of her four carriers were almost 500 meters long, only half as long as Hardway, but with the exception of the engines at the stern and the stubby command towers set over the bow, there wasn't anything on those carriers but launch bays. Not a single railgun battery or main gun of any kind appeared anywhere on them. They didn't even have defensive batteries. The four, fat hulls looked completely unarmored as well.
"Those are converted Pangzi Class ore haulers," Gusher said. "They made 'em into cheap-ass box carriers."
Jordo counted thirty-two, 90m-wide launch bays on each ship. "Each one of those bays look like they could hold two dozen fighters. More." The lack of armor made the carriers appear expendable. Between them and
well-protected by swarms of fighters was Taipan's fragile breaching ship, SCS Malibu. They couldn't afford to lose her. Without Malibu to breach space and open a hypermass transit, Taipan would be stuck here with no way to travel between star systems. Its 375-meter, wonder-wheel frame looked like all the other breaching ships Jordo had seen: just one alien bomb away from total destruction.
The value placed on the survival of the command ship, Taipan, was evidenced by the sheer volume of armor that had been welded on her. They'd added so much belt-iron steel plate to that little, 160m hull that the defensive cannon towers were now half their original height. The launch bay doors that were once flush with the hull now sat recessed almost two-meters.
The next voice on comms from Taipan wasn't the air controller who'd ordered the Hellcats home. It was a woman and she spoke with an accent that wasn't regional. Not unless money was a place. "133rd Lancers, this is Matilda Witt speaking. We didn't expect to see any Hardway flight elements for at least another hour."
"Lancer 1-1 to Taipan. Hardway is early to the rendezvous. You should have line of sight on her in less than fi-"
Matilda Witt cut him off. "Lancer 1-1, just kindly return to that rust-bucket of yours and tell Harry Cozen that I will expect him and his senior officers aboard my ship at eighteen-hundred hours. Tell him a two-star Privateer Admiral said so. And do make sure you tell him it's an order."
*****
Commander Ram Devlin stood right next to Harry Cozen on Hardway's bridge as the call came in from Lancer 1-1. The pilot relayed Matilda Witt's message verbatim. Harry Cozen heard it. Everyone on the bridge heard it. Ram knew she could have sent that message a hundred different ways, but she wanted to give Harry Cozen an order as publicly as possible.
Dana Sellis said, "It's an order?" The question hung over Hardway's bridge. She looked up from the NAV console to Harry Cozen in the command chair and said, "I didn't know there was anyone outside of fleet command who outranked you."
Cozen said, "Matilda only had one star like me until recently – until she got back from her first adventure behind the Sirius Line. She probably got the Board of Directors to give her a second star just so she'd outrank me. And they gave it to her, the ingrates. Taking control of my flight school and all my new fighter squadrons wasn't enough for her. Now, she's here to lord her new rank over me as well."
"Scuttlebutt says her squadrons' casualty rates are unusually high," Biko said.
"Higher than they would have been under my command."
"She managed to survive for three months behind the Sirius Line on her own," Ram said. "Of course she had casualties."
"I imagine that's exactly what the Board of Directors thought, Mr. Devlin. Because once she did make it home, they gave her 1200 more planes and 1200 new flight school graduates...all of them." Cozen turned away and looked out the front of the bridge before he clapped his hands loudly to clear the air, rubbed his palms together fast, and rose from the command chair. "Mr. Devlin, you will arrange a relief watch to take the bridge at 1745 hours. You, along with Mr. Biko and Ms. Sellis, will accompany me to Taipan. And strap on your sidearm, Mr. Devlin."
"Why?"
"Because your Honma & Voss Itar is just the sort of hand cannon that will provoke a response from our host." Cozen stepped into the lift.
"Twenty-four, new LiDAR contacts inbound," Biko said. "Fighters. IFF says they're Staas Company F-151s from Taipan's Air Group."
The squadron leader's voice called out on comms to the patrol junks between her and Hardway. She sounded like she'd screamed her throat raw. "Hardway combat air patrol, this is Hellcat 1-1, 55th Squadron. We are approaching your carrier and requesting landing clearance and bay assignment."
A flight of Hardway's gunnery junks on combat air patrol answered Hellcat 1-1 first. "55th Squadron, this is Malta. Standby, 55th..." When Malta called in, Air Group Commander Asa Biko told the CAP to pass them through. Seconds later, the gunnery junks veered away, and twenty-four Staas F-151s flew in over the bow looking like a pack of hungry predators. Hardway hadn't had so many interceptors flying off her since the Lancers' first bloody battles.
Biko leaned into the comms button as he thumbed it. "Hellcat Squadron, this is Hardway AT. You can park those fighters in bays 15, 16, and 17, port-side, primary bays. Redsuits there will sort you out. Try not to cook 'em with your exhaust. They bloody hate that. Welcome aboard, 55th."
"Wilco, Hardway," she said. "Will comply."
Biko asked Ram if he'd managed to find bunks for the Hellcats yet. It hadn't been easy, but as first officer that was part of Ram's job and he'd moved mountains to put the Hellcats where they'd feel most comfortable. He thought he'd done pretty well. "I got the Hellcats a couple of compartments in Forward Hab, Deck 2," he said, "right next door to the Lancers."
Chapter Two
Hardway and Taipan orbited in the ice moon's shadow, keeping the four box carriers between them. The twin, wonder-wheel hulls of fragile Malibu and Hardway's own breaching ship, Tipperary, held station in the very center of the formation, as protected as they could possibly be.
The longboat ferrying Hardway's senior officers to Taipan left from Bay One, the starboard of the two launch bays almost at the base of Hardway's command tower. Torpedo junk pilot, Dell Pardue flew them over the carrier's primary launch bay modules and the midships railgun batteries before she rolled them around the ship's armored, turret-studded sides.
When she turned the longboat in Taipan's direction, Ram glanced over her shoulder and out the front canopy. Entire constellations of pale blue exhaust flares buzzed around Matilda Witt's command ship, flying their combat air patrols in tight, echelon formation. At least ten sorties of Bitzers kept watch over the carriers. Ram noted more than one flight breaking orbit as they headed out to patrol the larger system.
He knew Witt's squadrons were powerful enough to protect them, but it almost hurt to look at the box carriers and their lack of armor. Clearly vital parts sat on the outside of the hull just waiting to be blown off. "There's not a scratch on any of those ships," Pardue said. "Any of you senior officer types notice that?" She pointed her chin at the thin-skinned carriers below. "The converted box-carriers down there. There's no battle damage."
"That," Harry Cozen said from the longboat's rear, "is because Matilda Witt doesn't send her carriers into battle." He rose from the seats in back and spoke as he came forward. "She doesn't fight like we do – like Hardway fights. Only her 151s go into battle. They sortie in such great numbers that they overwhelm the enemy. The carriers stay hidden somewhere safe. Same with Taipan." He pointed at Witt's command ship hanging over the box-carriers like an armored castle keep. "There's not a scratch on her command ship either, you'll note. Not one alien particle stream has ever ripped Taipan's armor."
"You say it like it's a bad thing," Dana said.
Harry Cozen suggested she ask Hardway's Air Group Commander, Asa Biko what he thought about the notion of their pilots taking all the risk.
Biko looked down at the box carriers and then up at the fighters on patrol. Biko remembered every pilot he'd lost, but he also remembered every time Hardway had taken a hit from the Squidies' big guns. Plenty of people died when alien particle streams ripped molten gashes up and down the carrier. Alien warheads or flying bombs that detonated against the hull could fill whole decks with firestorms and kill scores upon scores of crewmen, engineers, and company marines. Ram knew Biko was mentally weighing the lives of Hardway's pilots and crewmen against each other because he looked as if he'd bitten into something and didn't like the taste. That sour look remained on his face after he'd shifted his gaze to Witt's command ship.
SCS Taipan was barely longer than three mining junks laid end to end, but her armor was the thickest Ram had ever seen on a Staas Company ship. Once, her hull must have had a teardrop shape, but the armor plates had been welded on so thick in so many layers that Taipan no longer had the sleek lines she'd started with. Now, she looked more like a castle keep.
The
re wasn't a single mark on her as far as Ram could see. No particle stream had ever torn at her sides. No warhead had ever vaped craters in her. She'd gone three months behind enemy lines without any support and no weapon had ever touched her.
"Hardway longboat, this is Taipan Control. You are cleared for docking in our bay. Be advised, we have artificial gravity running at .5 gees."
"Roger, Taipan," Pardue said. "ETA one minute."
"Point five gees?" Dana said, "Is she crazy?"
"Great," Biko said. "Heavy gravity..."
Cozen said, "She keeps it heavy because nobody else does. She likes to have the advantage."
It was just half of one Earth gravity, but if you'd been out in the black for as long as most of Hardway's crew and living at .3 gees or less for all that time, then .5 gees weighed on you like a lead suit. It was worse if you were big like Biko and had spent years flying mining junks without any gravity at all. Ram could feel the awful tugging on his internal organs just thinking about it.
The add-on gun towers and the single railgun battery on Taipan's bow dressed her for war, but like almost all antebellum Earth ships, she'd originally been made for other things. Hardway had been a mining carrier. Harry Cozen's personal ship, Arbitrage, had been a salvage vessel, but the purpose for which Matilda Witt's ship, Taipan, had originally been made was difficult to discern.
On landing, they saw Taipan's launch bay was so small it could only accommodate a few longboats or a half-dozen of fighters. And it had been gilded. The polished bulkheads on all sides and even the inside of the bay doors had been engraved with the image of an ancient, Silk Road caravan seen in isometric perspective. The camels and traders and wagons wrapped around the bay and the precisely engraved gouges in the metal that had been used to render the Silk Road scene had been filled with gold so that all the figures and the entire caravan looked as if it were lit by rays of dawn.
