The Battle of Titan

by Sudipto Majumdar

  Taste of Triumph realized that with three void vessels hunting an unarmed scout, it was now next to impossible to accomplish the first task, but he would try nonetheless. He might be able to accomplish the second task partially in the final moments of the scout vessel. He now had a plan that he needed to discuss with Harmony.

  Harmony was in his niche inside the control chamber as expected. He approached him without preamble as is the way of their beings and started tasting him. Harmony confirmed that at the current rate of acceleration of the lead enemy vessel and the current rate of deceleration of the scout ship, they would pass each other in 89 cycles.

  It was unlikely that the enemy vessel would let the scout pass, it would start its attack the moment it reached closer. How close, they could not say, as they had no idea of the enemy’s weapons’ capability. To do this however, the enemy vessels would have to stop accelerating at some point and start decelerating and then reverse course to match speed and direction with the scout vessel.

  If the current rate of acceleration of the enemy ship is the maximum they can achieve, then that would mean, that they would have to start their reverse maneuver within the next few cycles and would then be able to match course and speed with the scout, arriving next to it in about 138 cycles.

  The scout however had one lever to play with that it could use to confuse and deceive the enemy. All the above calculations were based on the assumption of the scout ship keeping its current rate of deceleration constant. He was sure the enemy had done the same calculations as Harmony had, but the enemy had no way of knowing how the scout ship would decelerate, that was the trick Triumph would play with.

  He could start decelerating harder, but that would only delay the inevitable and would give him less information. The enemy will have to travel longer to catch up with the scout, but catch up they will.

  It was ridiculous to think that the enemy would have any issues with the small amount of extra fuel required. It would give them more time before the confrontation, but it would leave the scout worse off, because the confrontation would happen much further off from their gas giant target.

  He needed to have the confrontation to take place as close to the system as possible to give the mission the chance to collect as much information as possible. Many of the data measurements were still not complete and many of the orbiting bodies were not mapped with 64 out of 64 certainty. He would give the mission the maximum chance of data at the minimum possible distance from the star system and the gas giants.

  This meant that not only should the scout stop decelerating, but should accelerate at the maximum possible rate it can achieve without giving any thought to fuel conservation. It would not be in the need for any fuel soon enough.

  He confirmed with Harmony that the last readings suggested that the scout could accelerate at the maximum burn for another 146 cycles, before it would run out of fuel. That was more than enough. He did not expect the scout to last that long.

  He already had the momentum advantage over the enemy. The scout was still moving in towards the system at a fairly high speed, while the enemy was moving in the opposite direction at a much slower rate.

  The enemy would have to stop and reverse course and accelerate again and sustain the acceleration for a long time to have any hope of coming alongside the scout vessel. Otherwise the enemy will have to take a chance of a single shot at the scout vessel as it whizzes past them. Who knows they might get lucky and all three of the enemy void vessels might miss.

  If he was able to run the gauntlet successfully, then he had a good chance of reaching the gas giant, provided the enemy does not launch any more void vessels. Even if the enemy did launch more vessels, they would be confronted very close to the gas giant.

  It wouldn’t matter to the scout that much as it would have accomplished its mission of getting close to the gas giant. The scout would only get one fast fly-by opportunity to reconnoiter the system, and might miss many vital installations, but it was better than nothing.

  There was an added bonus to the acceleration strategy. The nozzles of the scout would point away from the star, thereby giving the sensors on board a far better look into the system. With the nozzle as a shining beacon removed from the sight of the enemy, Triumph hoped that it would reduce the long range targeting capability of the enemy as well.

  Harmony was locked with Triumph tasting each other intensely, while Triumph was both explaining as well as thinking out the entire logic. The amazing communication means their beings had evolved using the chemical and electrical signals of their slime, meant that Triumph was communicating the ideas and thoughts with their rationale almost instantly to Harmony, with snippets of Triumphs past tactical experience adding force in one direction or other. It was like being inside the mind of Triumph while he was internally debating it out and coming to decisions.

  Harmony agreed with the course of action, and had now developed a new respect for the acumen of this warrior seer of the council. There was something else that Harmony learnt from the mind of Triumph, which made him appreciate what it takes to be a member of the council. The military genius of the plan that Triumph had hatched up for the defense of the unarmed scout ship during their encounter with the enemy void vessels was sublime.

  Harmony was now thankful that he had a warrior genius on his side. He had found a new respect for the warrior creed, for the curious caste could never come up with such a devilish plan of combat. The scout may or may not be able to evade the enemy, but it would be able to give the enemy one hell of a surprise!

  Chapter 10

  Houston, we have a problem!

  Summer of 2038

  Jason was coasting along nicely in his job as the chief mission controller of Sentinel. Things were running smoothly here in Houston for a change, and his little conspiracy with Oleg, who had now roped in a few others was going along quite nicely.

  Sedna – 1 was still a few weeks away from the rendezvous point with the alien ship. It continuously sent data on its scans and sensors, which told them nothing fundamentally new, but refined their understanding of the alien ship.

  Sedna – 1 had tried sending signals on all possible radio frequencies and laser. These were both digital and analog images, sounds, mathematical symbols and stuff not even Jason understood completely.

  These messages have been defined in the 1960’s and have been refined continuously in the hope that aliens would find some common reference point with us, and be able to communicate. All that was received back by Sedna – 1 in return, was silence. So be it, but Jason was glad there had been no surprises till now.

  That changed now, as the large screen reserved in the control hall for communication with Darmstadt, the ESA mission control of Sedna – 1 in Germany pinged loudly. On the screen was a handsome young man whom Jason did not know, but was wearing the lapel of the shift mission controller, said with a distinct German accent. “I know this sounds corny, but Houston we have a problem.” The naughty smile on the speaker’s face, to the historically famous words, did not bring any smiles in Houston. They all gave an anxious look back.

  The man on the screen continued. “About 10 minutes ago we noticed with alarm, as the alien ship seemed to have disappeared! On checking through various other spectrums including radar, we can confirm that the alien ship is still there. It seems that they have switched off their engine. The alien ship seems to have stopped decelerating. Since you didn’t raise the alarm, I thought I will keep you informed. Darmstadt out.” The man finished with a smug smile.

  There seemed to be some competition going around between the two control centers. They had reasons to be smug, our guys screwed up. Damn how could we miss this? Thought Jason. We are not keeping our eyes on the ball, we are slacking. He will have to give a real good pep talk about concentrating on their jobs. After today’s ass kicking, he guessed that his team would hopefully be extra vigilant trying to give the Europeans some payback.

  Everyone in the control room scrambled to thei
r desks. There were coffee spilt and toes stepped on, but no one cared right now. Within a minute a woman’s voice came from the rows of desk lined up in front of Jason shouting “We see it now, just as described by Darmstadt!”

  What the hell are the aliens up to? This just doesn’t make any sense, Jason thought. Before he sank deeper into his thoughts, Jason realized there was one task he had to do. It was time to give his co-conspirators on the other side his first token of goodwill. Hopefully he will be rewarded in kind later. He quickly used his tablet to compose the message and sent it off. Then he jumped off his raised platform and dove into the trenches to get as much information from the terminals as he could.

  Sentinel’s sensors were robust military grade, while Sedna – 1 had civilian scientific grade sensors. They may not be robust, but they were far more sensitive and sophisticated. Moreover Sedna – 1 was much nearer to the alien craft. So they could not hope to get better information than Darmstadt.

  All they could do was independently confirm Darmstadt’s observations. Jason went back to his platform and his desk placed there. He touched the control for the Darmstadt screen. The same man was on their screen in a second and Jason spoke. “Houston confirms your observations. Any new news since your last update?”

  “Well nothing drastically new since then Jason”, damn that is annoying thought Jason. This man knew his name and Jason didn’t know this man or his name, and this was not the right time or place to ask him either.

  The man continued “However we can confirm now that the thrusters are not lit at all in any direction. It seems to be shut off completely. They seem to be coasting. If you hold the line for some time, I may be able to give you some interesting speculations though. We are processing some images right now. Just excuse me for a moment.” The man moved off the screen after saying that, and Jason waited impatiently for him to come back.

  He returned after almost 5 minutes and said “Ok Jason here is what we’ve got. First keep in mind that our forward telescope can see the space ship in visible light, but the image is still just a few pixels wide.

  We are seeing it in reflected sunlight, which as would imagine is very faint at the point in the edge of the solar system where the alien ship is. So the contrast of the image is extremely poor. We were running image enhancements with human help to try to improve the quality of the pictures, hence it took us the time.

  What we think we are seeing is that the craft is changing its orientation, or slowly tumbling. We cannot be sure but it is likely that it is no longer presenting the same profile towards us as it had been for all these months and years while it was decelerating. The only reasonable conclusion one can reach from this is that they are turning around to accelerate.” The man finished.

  Jason said immediately. “That doesn’t make sense. It will make them zoom past the solar system after spending so much energy to slow down to reach here!”

  The man from Darmstadt gave a shrug and said. “That is true, we are also equally puzzled. One speculation is that this is a recce mission, where the Solar system is one of the many systems this ship is tasked to explore in a flyby mission. You guys have done many such missions in the past yourselves while exploring planets like the famous voyager missions. I am sending over the data, your imaging guys can have a look and give us a second opinion.”

  Jason thanked the man and cut off the line. His imaging team came to the same conclusion as the ESA-ISRO team about the images. About an hour later there was excitement again as the light from the alien craft brightened slightly. This time Houston was on the ball and already well aware of it when Darmstadt notified them.

  The images from Sedna – 1 were better but both were able to independently confirm that the alien craft had turned around 180° and started accelerating. No change in direction. It looked crazy to them. The craft was still headed straight towards the sun, and instead of decelerating and reducing its considerable speed, it was accelerating as if it wanted to ram the sun!

  It was an hour later that he heard the same woman from the trenches shout. This time he could see her, as she stood up excited. Saloni was hardly the type of woman who gets excited, this must be important. “We may not have as good images as them, but I bet we know something that the Euros don’t”. She said excitedly.

  This rivalry thing was getting a bit too much. Hope all of us can stay professional out here. Jason was trying to stem one rivalry with his little conspiracy. He didn’t want a new one with old friends. He will deal with it later he thought, right now let’s see what she has got.

  She had transferred a graphic on the main screen from her terminal. It was a line diagram with the sun in the middle, earth in its orbit and the four space crafts in question, one alien and three human. The alien space craft’s past path was drawn as a solid line, while its expected line of travel was a dotted line, which headed straight to the sun. The three earth crafts were also drawn similarly, with their dotted lines heading straight towards the alien craft’s dotted line, where they would meet up with the alien craft.

  The three earth space crafts were not aligned in an exact straight line, travelling one behind the other as one might think, but were slightly staggered in a mild arc formation. This was because they had all been launched at different times from earth, and earth was in orbit, and hence at different locations at the time of launch of each vehicle.

  Saloni started explaining the diagram. “As you know, this were the original course of all the dramatis personae in space. Our ships are heading towards the alien ship, but the alien ship was not heading towards any of our ships, it was heading towards the sun. As a result our ships would pass the alien ship at a very small angle and not head on.

  However I have noticed an anomaly in the new images after the aliens lit up to accelerate. It is very slight and unfortunately we need the Euros with their better picture to confirm. There is a difference in the direction of acceleration this time. It is so slight that it was not noticeable in our initial observation. Even now it is within the margin of sampling error, hence we need the Euro pictures to confirm.

  However if we assume that the data is accurate, then they have changed course to this.” She tapped an area on her terminal, and the image changed very subtly, but what was hard to miss was the dotted line of the alien ship. It no longer headed towards the sun, but arced slightly and directly met up with Sedna – 1!

  Everybody in the hall let out a collective gasp. The aliens had finally taken note of us! They were headed straight towards the first human ship.

  That still didn’t explain why they accelerated. If they wanted to meet up with Sedna – 1, they could have kept decelerating and made the slight course correction. In fact it would make sense to keep decelerating if you want to meet up with the ship. Accelerating did not make sense at all. He needed to confirm this with Darmstadt, but before that he had to take the bull by the horns.

  “Ok this is important and we need to confirm this with Darmstadt. However before we do that, there are certain clarifications I would like to make for the benefit of Ms. Sood particularly and for all of you in general.” He deliberately addressed Saloni formally by her last name. In an informal place like this, it meant a mild rebuke.

  “First they are Europeans and not Euros, I am sure you all understand the pejorative implied in that slang. Second Sedna – 1 is not just a European operation, I am sure you are all aware that the Indians are involved in it too.” This time specifically looking at Saloni to remind her of the place of origin of her ancestors.

  “Third and most important, they are our allies and old friends. They are not the Chinese for god’s sake!” Jason regretted the last sentence the moment he had uttered it. Here he was with his conspiracy, trying to remove rivalries and yet he ended up putting the Chinese in bad light. I guess old habits die hard even for a person like him.

  “I understand that they kicked your butt earlier in the day, and I can always appreciate a healthy rivalry, but let it not get personal or interfer
e with our professionalism. Hopefully we will be able to kick back their butts with this information and call it quits in a friendly game.”

  He said the last sentence with a smile indicating that he was on their team and also wanted to win, but in a friendly game. All the people in the trenches made noises and gestures to indicate that they understood and would follow.

  Jason let it go at that and started the conversation with Darmstadt. To all their delight, Darmstadt had not noticed the change in direction yet, and scrambled with their own data to re-analyze it. They were put on hold while the data was analyzed, but this time Houston didn’t mind waiting. There was a distinct look of gloat on their faces, especially a certain Ms. Saloni Sood.

  The handsome man, with previously a smug smile returned to the screen after about 10 minutes. This time the smug smile was gone, and he said. “Houston, Darmstadt confirms the change in course with its initial calculations. It is still within the margin of error, and can be unequivocally confirmed, only with only a few more hours of data, but we think the calculations have a high probability of being correct. Good work Houston, and thanks for the heads up.” Well the man is gracious in defeat, you have to give him that.

  Within the next few hours, the changed course was confirmed beyond doubt. The Doppler radar had also sent back the data confirming without doubt that the alien craft was now accelerating at the same rate as it had been decelerating, which probably was its maximum thrust. The ETA for all the human crafts reaching the alien ship would have changed.

  All the human ships will have to make slight course correction to meet the alien ship. The team got themselves busy charting the new course. Jason had been messaging this co-conspirators all these hours through the drama, and had not heard anything back from them. Finally he got a single word in return. The message simply said “Thank you.”