by Aer-ki Jyr
“Headed for a mid-course rendezvous outside of radar range,” Paul surmised.
“That’s what I’m hoping for. If they are we can ID their contact then follow the flow of supplies to the warships.”
“If you’re right this explains how they’re getting supplies out, but not where the phantom ships are being built.”
“If we’re lucky the supplies might be going there,” Roger pointed out. “Either way there’s no reason to intercept the ship now.”
“If it’s a cargo ship,” Paul amended as he scrutinized the photos. “How big is it?”
“Bigger,” Roger said, already having run some basic numbers. “At least by a factor of 2. We’re too far away to get a good radar silhouette.”
“Speed?”
“Slow. Not nearly the closure rate of the warship, which also suggests a different model.”
Paul nodded his agreement. “Good. What else do we have in the area?”
“Another cutter moving into support position a few hours out and two passing freighters.”
The freighters would give them two more radar platforms, Paul knew, but they would be of no other use.
“Any probables?”
“Nothing matches up yet, so I’m guessing they’re heading into a waiting position. When the target comes into range they accelerate, match speeds to transfer cargo, then the phantom moves off and the transponder signal from the tagged ship never so much as budges.”
“That’d be my guess,” Paul said, looking down the traffic lines to see what was already on the way…unfortunately there were more than 15 ships that were to pass through the area in the next 2 days, so it was impossible to make any reasonable picks. “Any response to our radar?”
“Nope, looks like they’re blind as a bat…or pretending as much.”
“I went over the telemetry from the battle again, and as far as I can tell the ship sent no signals whatsoever. Their friends may not even have missed them yet if all their ships are running dark.”
“Any word from the French?” Roger asked, wondering if their ruckus had been detected.
“Still nothing. It’s possible no one was paying attention to the radar and they just missed it.”
“Or they had it turned off.”
“Regardless, they’ve made no inquiries or public statements, but the ship did reach port this morning so I don’t think our secret will last much longer.”
“You think they’ll back off the attacks?” Roger asked, not really thinking that likely.
“Might make them pause to find out what happened to their ship, so we need to stay on this one without spooking it. We need to find out where these bastards are coming from and if they turtle up we’re going to have a hard time finding them again.”
“Well, the only way we can track them is with radar, and if they get smart to that we don’t have any other options.”
“I know,” Paul said, wishing they had a way of putting a homing beacon on the ship. “Let’s just hope we get lucky with this one.”
Four days later the phantom cargo ship finally moved from its holding position just off the main Lunar traffic lane and began to accelerate for an intercept…but not before another attack occurred elsewhere in orbit, with a small Japanese transport being hit down in zone 3 inside radar range. The warship destroyed the ship and retreated back to the dark zones before anyone could arrive to assist, though a nearby American warship did make a futile attempt at pursuit.
The position of the attack did give Star Force another data point to add in their analysis, but at the cost of another 12 lives. The rising death count was really beginning to get under Harper’s skin and by the time the enemy cargo ship made its move the Mjolnir had not one, but three cutters standing by at varying distances to insure that it did not get away this time.
More than an hour before the intercept was made both the battleship and the Archons had done the math and identified the selected target for what they assumed was a rendezvous…which turned out to be a Chinese transport, Jaguar-class.
Not wanting to give their presence away, Harper had the cutters stop transmitting active radar once Cyclops had a lock on the large Star Force-produced transport. He had one of the cutters close in on the converging ships in case this did turn out to be an actual attack…which was when they noticed that the Jaguar wasn’t broadcasting an active radar signal of its own.
The cutters were picking up the transport’s strong transponder signal and maneuvered via that reference point, which the enemy ship must also have been doing right up to the point where it flanked the Jaguar along the third cargo pod and docked with the much larger ship.
“Son of a bitch,” Liam said from the sanctum control room.
“Monitor for distress signals,” Paul said, though he agreed with Liam’s assessment.
“You think they’re hijacking it?” Jason asked standing beside Paul, both of whom were still dressed in training clothes, having interrupted a sparring session to be here when the intercept happened.
“Probably not, but let’s not jump to conclusions before we see how this runs its course.”
“Clint,” Roger said from the map table. “What’s the freighter’s destination?”
The junior adept dug into the computer files and pulled up the registered flight plan from Star Force’s navigational database. “Lunar orbit rendezvous with dropships from the Chinese territorial zones.”
“Have they filed after that?” Liam asked.
“Just this morning,” Clint said with a smile. “Back down to a zone 4 Chinese station…no stops at Star Force installations.”
“Are you going to grab the freighter when it arrives at Luna?” Jason asked.
“I’m tempted to, but we need to follow the unmarked ship on its next leg without spooking them.”
“What do you suppose their endgame is?” Roger whispered, glancing at Paul.
“Economic warfare,” he said without hesitation, having had a long time to think this over. “They haven’t picked a fight with a nation that has military assets, they’re just hitting the small ones that have been rising in stature. If they attack them on the surface they’d be starting a war, but with phantom pirate ships making the attacks in space they can deny responsibility while crippling the other nations’ orbital economies. Every ship that’s been hit has had a full load of either personnel or cargo, so they’re not just jumping anything that comes within range.”
“Why not us?” Jason asked.
“They’ll probably get around to that, but for now they need us as a business partner.”
“And witness,” Roger added. “They know we monitor all traffic, so if someone wants to blame them all they have to do is ask us where their ships have been and we become their alibi.”
“Or,” Liam added, “it could be a ploy to diminish our monopoly. Up until now Star Force has had all the answers and been two steps ahead of every problem. Now we can’t protect ourselves against attack, or anyone else for that matter, without allying with one of the military powers, which would include the Chinese.”
Paul looked over at Liam. “Good point.”
“Signal from the Mjolnir,” Clint announced.
Paul walked over a few steps and hit the activation button, with the communications screen glowing to life with an image of Captain Harper. “Yes.”
“The target has docked with the Chinese ship, which I assume you already know.”
“Yes, we’re monitoring.”
“What are your orders?”
“Shadow the target wherever it goes. I want to know where those supplies are going.”
“And the Jaguar?”
“Let it go for now. As long as its transponder is active we don’t need it followed.”
“What if it makes another rendezvous?”
“If we want to start shadowing all Chinese cargo ships at some point we know where to find them, but for now I want you to take all three cutters and follow the phantom. If it meets up with ano
ther ship I want both followed, and so forth down the line so the more ships you have tailing it the better.”
Harper nodded. “I understand. I’ll pull what additional ships I can into the area.”
“The Chinese?” Davis mewed as Paul filled him in on their most recent discovery. “Now that’s interesting.”
“It’s possible but very unlikely,” Paul said from the chair across the Director’s desk, “that the ship was hijacked. We should know for sure when the ship reaches Lunar orbit and rendezvouses with the Chinese personnel there.”
“I had my suspicions after Taiwan was hit,” Davis admitted, “but the randomized attacks afterward threw me. The Chinese have been more compliant the past few years than they’d previously been, so I figured they had accepted our position if only to maneuver around us. Our reluctance to participate in military orders has made our position of neutral arbiter more legitimate than any nation can claim, so they intend to flip the coin and turn it into our weakness. A bold move on their part.”
“I have Harper shadowing their transport to wherever it’s going, and so far it appears they haven’t noticed our presence. We’ll know soon enough if they’re leading us on a wild goose chase or straight back to their base of operations or another warship…hopefully both. At which point we’re going to have to come out of the shadows.”
Davis nodded resolutely. “Whatever you do make it count and let them know beyond a shadow of a doubt that we have military dominance. I’ll need that to sell the point when the backlash comes.”
Paul frowned. “You don’t think they’ll be grateful that we stopped the attacks?”
“Some will, others will be outraged that our anti-military stance was all for show. Then they’ll be even more ticked when we refuse to sell them our superior weaponry…but the biggest struggle is going to be keeping the backlash against the Chinese from escalating into a war. Not only are we going to stop them from shooting up ships, we’re going to make sure no one returns the favor once their involvement in the attacks get out. To do that I need you to assert full military control over the system.”
“Consider it done,” Paul said, cracking a smile. “I’ll get the Orion headed this way.”
The cutters tracking the phantom transport followed it for three agonizingly long days as the presumably Chinese vessel creeped its way across the orbital backwater zones until it crossed paths with another unmarked ship…however, they didn’t meet up, instead passing each other at several hundreds of miles distance. Harper dispatched one of the cutters to follow the other ship, while the remaining two continued to hound the cargo ship as it travelled further and further away from the infrastructure bands circling the Earth.
Eventually the ship began to slow, with no apparent target in range of the cutters’ reduced radar output, scaled down so that they could follow the ship at a much closer distance. It wasn’t until several hours later when they picked up a faint radar signature ahead of the ship but slightly askew from the transport’s flight line, which then corrected as it came within 100 miles.
Watching from the control room Paul presumed that the rendezvous was being coordinated through line of sight without radar or transponders, meaning that the ship flew to a pre-specified set of coordinates and then visually looked around for its target…which in this case turned out to be a large space station.
Within an hour Cyclops had the location under surveillance and began transmitting images to the sanctum, which offered up the explanation to one running mystery.
“It’s a shipyard,” Liam confirmed, pointing out several construction slips. “I don’t see any gravity discs or cylinders, so the crew must be in zero g the entire time.”
“Same as their ships,” Roger pointed out. “Not very smart of them.”
“Moving disc or stationary box?” Paul asked sarcastically. “Which is easier to build?”
“Looks like they’ve got a half-constructed skeleton,” Liam also noted as they poured over the stills being transmitted from three different Cyclops stations, giving them multiple angles on the station. “Three slips total?”
“That’s what I’m seeing,” Paul confirmed. “Docking ports on top,” he said, pointing to the rectangular cube with a T-shaped module sticking out the top that the cargo ship was just now drifting in towards.
“Any weapons?” Roger asked, not spotting any yet.
“No,” Liam agreed. “I think this is just a clandestine shipyard. Anonymity is probably their only defense.”
“We’ll need to confirm that,” Paul noted, but in agreement.
“We taking it?” Roger asked.
“Not just yet. Let’s see if we can’t get a few more ships under surveillance while we assemble our strike force. I don’t want to leave unaccounted warships wandering around orbit if we can tag them all prior.”
“Take away their supply lines and they’ll be neutralized one way or another,” Liam pointed out.
“Or go nuts and shoot everything in their path until then,” Roger argued. “Including kamikaze runs against our stations.”
“I hadn’t thought of that,” Liam admitted.
“They’ve already showed they’re willing to kill themselves,” Roger went on to explain. “If they know they can’t resupply then they might as well hurt us as much as they can in the process.”
“We need to get all Chinese transports under surveillance,” Paul said, getting nods of agreement from his two peers. “If they’re transferring cargo we should be able to locate the warships or their supply transports. Let’s get as many of them tagged as we can before we hit the shipyard.”
“Pointing out the obvious,” Roger said, “we don’t have enough ships for that.”
“Follow the big ones,” Liam answered before Paul could. “The smaller transports can’t carry much auxiliary cargo.”
“How many Jaguars do they have?” Roger asked.
“Four,” Paul said, having already pulled up a ship list. “Plus six Leos. Their smaller ships are a mix of Star Force models and their own construction, which are too slow to worry about.”
“We need ten tails then,” Liam said, looking up their current transponder signatures. “Unless you want to use Cyclops for some of them?”
“Double up with Cyclops, but if there is a rendezvous we need a tail to follow the contact. I don’t trust the telescopes to be able to hone in on an accelerating target.”
“I’ll make the arrangements,” Liam offered.
Paul glanced across the map table at Roger. “Let’s organize some boarding parties.”
9
December 3, 2059
“Any response?” Voss asked his ops station as the Turok closed on the illicit shipyard with six support ships in escort formation.
“Nothing yet.”
The Captain returned his eyes to the visual display, magnified numerous times by the Cyclops surveillance station and transmitted to his battleship so they could monitor their target in detail as they approached. The station appeared to have no weapons of any kind, but the self-destruct packages that the warships carried worried him. If the station was also so equipped then his boarding parties would be put in danger, so he intended his attack to be slow and methodical…allowing the enemy plenty of time to blow themselves up if they wanted to before his ships came within range.
That said, he knew the Chinese had nukes and even though they wouldn’t be as effective in the vacuum of space they’d be the perfect option for a station-sized self destruct, which would violently throw debris at his fleet as well as radiation. His battleship was defended against both, but Star Force hadn’t had the opportunity to field test a nuclear detonation in space so the exact yield and outcome was a bit of a question mark.
It was also possible that since the Chinese had been using missiles as their offensive weapons they could have some equipped with nukes as well, and just one hitting the Turok’s hull would be a disaster, though he doubted it would destroy the ship through 10 meters of Herculium a
rmor plating.
That and many other possibilities worried Voss, and with so little intel and this being the first engagement with the Turok he felt the need for extra caution. Star Force had a massive advantage in this situation and he didn’t plan to squander it in haste. Another transport had been attacked a week ago, with Star Force arriving minutes too late to prevent the attack, but they did manage to save most of the ship, with the Italian crew radioing in the incident to their government, which then spread out across the planet’s news agencies.
They reported the attack and the rescue, both in unidentifiable ships, which meant that the Chinese probably knew someone was on to them now, so it was possible that the shipyard had been put on alert and had a few surprises waiting for them.
The second Chinese warship had been taken out quickly with a missile attack from a cutter, given that it couldn’t be disabled and potentially captured while it was actively firing on the Italians. Star Force had dispatched a cleanup crew to recover the ship and debris, but so far had not taken credit for the rescue. The SR ship dispatched to aid the wounded Italian transport had originally been tasked to the strike force, and after a quick patch job on the freighter had returned to the group and was now flying just above and to the rear of the Turok, waiting for Voss’s orders to launch its boarding party.
As they approached the shipyard Voss sent one of his two cutters on ahead to draw any potential fire while his other cutter, two destroyers, frigate, heavy destroyer, and battleship waited at a safe distance. The remote pilot brought the small ship up within half a mile of the station and flew two laps around the perimeter, drawing no response from either the station or the cargo ship attached to the docking T, which had arrived two days earlier.
As the cutter circled around a different perimeter it passed by the one construction slip with a partially constructed skeleton in place, coming into sight of the half dozen workers in spacesuits that began running/jumping/thrusting for the airlock when they finally took notice, though the whole transitional process took them several minutes to get inside, with several of their handheld tools abandoned to drift off into space.
