Jethro: First to Fight

by Hechtl, Chris

  They kept jinking, a moving target was a live target after all. Movement was life in this deadly game of David and Goliath.

  The destroyer was still going wide as the ship picked up on their threat and tried to turn, throwing off their aim. The ship was fighting stupid, turning to expose it's flank to the fighters. Sure it brought more guns to bear on them, but it gave them a bigger target and threw off the chaser guns that had been lining them up.

  Her thumb caressed the release toggle on her flight stick. She frowned as the tone turned from a low pitch to a high and her HUD went green. She pulled the trigger twice. “Cobra four, fox one, fox one!” she said, indicating two birds in space. She immediately pulled back on the stick, climbing. “I'm high and dry!” she said, executing the second step in the attack.

  Her fighter kicked into full throttle as she climbed, angling to pitch up over the warship. She felt her vision edge and did her crunches. The inertial dampeners in the cockpit behind her seat were good, but they weren't perfect. That was why her flight suit was designed much like the flight suits of the twentieth and twenty first century, sacks inflated in the limbs to push her blood flow to her thorax and head to keep her conscious.

  That however left her limbs tingling as blood flowed out of them, which was why she relied on her implants for control of this maneuver.

  “Going low and slow,” Sticks replied, dropping down out of the fire. His fighter was slower than hers now, still burdened by his torpedo load. They were performing a classic scissor, splitting up to make the enemy choose between them, divide and conquer.

  For a brief half second the destroyer's point defense tried to stick with them before it dropped off and then refocused on the more immediate threat, the incoming torpedoes.

  ...*...*...*...*...

  “Torpedoes inbound on the port stern quarter!” the defense officer exclaimed, looking up in alarm.

  The Captain frowned ferociously. He'd discounted the threat of the fighters, now that was coming back to haunt him. The noisome flies had turned into wasps with very lethal stingers. “Intercept the torpedoes! Ignore the fighters! Throw up a wall damn it! Reinforce shields and get us around!”

  “We're trying sir!”

  “Try harder damn it!” The Captain raged, slamming his fists against the arm rests of his chair in frustration.

  ...*...*...*...*...

  Hurt locker grinned as her torps spun off decoys from their flanks. They were coming in staggered, working together through their limited dumb AI programming. Bundles of flash exploded around them, throwing off the tin can's lidar.

  Torpedo one screened her sister, using her force emitter to plow the road. Despite the decoys some of the fire targeted them, that's where their penetration aids and programming came in, making them bob and weave while ghost emitters danced around them, making them harder to target and hit.

  It was a magnificent performance, but even with her bow shield for protection she took a hit by the tin can's primary graser mount and she kicked up from the force of the impact. She barely cleared her sister's shield edge as she tumbled in space. A follow up shot tore the torpedo apart.

  “Damn!” Hurt locker swore. But she kept watching the rear feed as the other torpedo used the cover of the explosion to come in closer. It wove, adjusting its course briefly and then went hard over and came boring in flat out at maximum drive thrust as it hit the terminal attack point.

  The torpedo's bow wall served four purposes, it one shielded the torpedo at speed from particles, micrometeorites and low energy incoming fire. The gravitic lens effect also served to magnify and slightly distort the image of the torpedo. Third, it could act as a tractor, latching onto the mass of its target and drawing itself in if it's main drive failed. But fourth, it was a shield popper, a mini grav lance. When two force emitters interacted, if they weren't synched and controlled by the same computer bad things tended to happen. In this case the torpedo’s computer deliberately oscillated the field strength and frequency up and down rapidly over the microseconds it had, tearing the destroyer's shields apart, ripping a hole through them and overloading the emitters.

  In that fraction of a second the torpedo passed through, the computer on board recognized where it was and detonated.

  The single force emitter behind the warhead drew the last of the torpedoes power, supercharging it for a brief microsecond as the warhead went off. It formed a cone, with its open mouth pointed to the target. The warhead's explosion was caught with its back to an invisible wall, one that would only last briefly, but it followed the path of least resistance, like a cannon it's gases were channeled into the direction of the target.

  One megaton of explosive force acted as a blowtorch on the exposed flank of the ship, scouring away anything in its path. Sensor arrays, communications antenna, drive pods, shields, weapon mounts, anything. Any hole that was exposed was breached, with the gases entering in through port holes or newly exposed wiring access points.

  The EMP tore at the sensitive but still hardened electronics on the hull and in the exposed part of the ship. The neutrons followed the pathways, some copper, some superconductors, all to tear at the electronics, forcing them to either shut themselves down in self doubt, or to malfunction and fail.

  Her weapons bay doors had been opened to allow her grasers and point defense weapons to fire, now that came back to haunt the ship. Entire gun crews were torn apart by the explosion. Capacitors blew like firecrackers, tearing apart things around them and sending cascading power surges back at the ship's power network or through anything they touched. Equipment with surge protection handled the hammer of energy, but it had to go somewhere. Breakers that had been left out or bypassed melted down, wiring melted, and EPS conduits blew inward.

  The ship rocked with the explosion, bucking as her helmsman tried to recover. However he was now missing the RCS on his port side so the job just got harder.

  Hurt locker saw all this play out over three seconds and yodeled over the radio. “Fire in the hole!”

  “Hurt locker buy's the shots!” Joker retorted. They had had a running bet, the first to go off script and yodel would buy the shots.

  Martha didn't have time to respond, she was already maneuvering for the second stage of her attack. Her drive suddenly cut and her beautiful fighter pitched end of end in a one eighty flip, exchanging nose for tail. Suddenly she was drifting along her original course, but pointed back at her enemy. She saw weapons fire go wide as it had been programmed for her previous course. She hit the throttle again, boring in once more and then she grinned, switching to her main gun.

  “This is Cobra four, stage two, guns ablazing!” she said as the tin can shuddered and it's bubble shield died. She could see it's port hull was thoroughly torn up. She gleefully pulled the trigger and added to the damage. Her implants linked to the computer, they targeted items of opportunity, most importantly the ship's shields and weapons. The primary targets were those that could shoot back at her of course, but anything that she could hit she did. She zipped across the tin can and then doubled back, making another run. Her spinal mount graser tore each target to shreds.

  “This is Cobra 3, making run,” Sticks said over their shared link.

  “Sticks go with one then go guns,” Hurt locker said, biting one lip. She was chewing this sucker up, it's main guns were gone on her dorsal. She was busy scouring the thing clean.

  “Roger, I'll go for her engines,” Sticks replied. She could hear the disappointment in the Veraxin's tone, he wanted a ship kill to his credit. Well, that was too bad, if they could take the ship they would, it would mean one more hull to their fleet. That was more important than ego- if they could get the pirates dug out of there.

  “Cobra 3, Fox one!” Sticks said and then flipped. He added his own gun to the carnage, but the keel still had functioning weapons. His incoming torpedo took a glancing hit but bore on.

  When it erupted it scoured away the pods on the stern and keel, and crumpled the lower fusion thrust
er. It sputtered and then died, the other two remaining drives sputtered themselves, and spat.

  The graser turret that had been lining a shot up on the Veraxin's fighter took a hit from behind by the explosion and debris just as it was about to fire. Like a slap to the back of the head the force of the impact drove the turret's barrels down to its own deck as Gunner's mate Rocko pulled the trigger. Four terawatts of intense energy tore down the barrels and into the destroyer's hull.

  The hull armor was strong, but not strong enough. It had been designed to dissipate and contain damage from thousands of kilometers out, not a measly ten centimeters. The beams were concentrated in packets of energy a centimeter thick. Four terawatts of energy tore through the armor like tissue paper, digging in like stilettos into the ship's own bowls. They tore at the ship's already fragile systems, ripping apart the power feeds from her one functional fusion reactor. The power room crew had just enough time to hit the big red kill switch to scram the reactor.

  The Horathians had unfortunately replaced a lot of the inert superconductors used to channel power or electrical control signals with copper or fiber optic plastic. These melted down, molten plastic and copper splattered and dribbled all over the interior of the conduits and into the guts of the ship. When the air was sucked out of the compartment they were left to drift, attaching themselves here and there to whatever they stuck to, shorting out more equipment. Suddenly the ship went dark as the last of her central power was sapped from her EPS conduits. Her systems were suddenly thrown on internal back up capacitors and batteries.

  “Did we kill it?” Sticks asked eagerly. The ship drifted as if it had a dead stick, slowly rolling counter clockwise. She frowned as the starboard flank slowly turned towards her.

  “I'm thinking... no,” Hurt locker replied as point defense lasers started up again, firing blindly at her. Her ship took a glancing hit on the starboard side, sending her into a tumble. “I'm hit!” she said, flipping into recovery and damage control mode.

  “I'm coming back Hurt locker!” Sticks said, now concerned. “I'll cover you!”

  “Stick to the mission!” She urged, fighting the controls. Something had blown in her shields, they were gone. Her RCS kept kicking. “Come on baby,” she urged softly, fighting the controls. Finally she hit the cut off sequence, cutting the RCS out when nothing more could be done. Most likely something in its micro computer had been cooked. She checked her wing, turning her head slowly to see the damage. It looked okay, just scorched where the RCS pod was embedded in it. She frowned.

  “You okay lady?” Sticks asked.

  “Oh I'm fine, a little banged up, but still a bitch to be reckoned with,” Hurt locker replied. She returned her attention to the drifting destroyer. “I think someone else is in worse shape than I am though,” she said, smiling.

  “I'd say so. Let's get you back to the barn,” Sticks said.

  “Nah, I'm good. Let's just sit here and see if I can get my systems back up,” she said, still working with damage control. She really didn't want to move fast with her shields down, bad things tended to get in the way when you did that.

  ...*...*...*...*...

  Firefly came around the planet in a slingshot, picked up speed instead of dumping it, then bored on through the tangle of Horathian ships. “It looks like the fighters got one tin can,” CIC reported. “Two gunships are limping as well.” The ship's main view screen and plot were updated. There was a muted cheer from the bridge crew.

  The Captain noted only three fighter IFF's remaining. She frowned, Cobra 5 was missing. Damn. “CIC, get with the fighter computers, find out what happened to Cobra 5. Plot a last known position for a future SAR.”

  “Aye aye Captain. We've got a sitrep, according to Cobra 4, Cobra 5 is KIA.”

  “Damn.”

  “Let's see what we can do,” the Captain said, leaning forward eagerly. “Hurt Locker's softened them up, let's get in and knock them down. Launch remaining fighters.”

  “Launch remaining fighter compliment aye,” Purple Thorn said. She hit a key and then looked up. “Prifly reports they are away,” she said. Four new IFF's entered the plot, moving out on their own engagement missions. They would each hit a target, leaving Cutlass to Firefly.

  “Spin?” Purple Thorn asked.

  “Spin and flip. Get ready,” the Captain said. “We'll get one shot at this,” she murmured.

  Firefly went into another corkscrew, spinning and jiggling along her base course, dodging any lock the Horathian's attempted to get.

  While she was doing that micro pods were being spat out her counter missile ports, along with bursts of chaff and flares.

  Her force beams reached out, oscillating between tractor and repel in microseconds, ripping and tearing at the enemy's shields, overloading their nodes, overheating them or tearing the nodes apart. Firefly's main turrets and missile tubes fired, tearing into the now vulnerable ships around her. Anything that was on her base course was shredded by her bow missiles and guns. She pitched up and down, weaving around wreckage. “Bob and weave, keep us a moving target,” the Captain said.

  “Aye aye Captain,” the helmsman said.

  “Guns, launch remaining missiles on the Cutlass. Let's finish this.”

  ...*...*...*...*...

  Captain Maul snarled at the damage report as his ship rocked once more. That fool in gold braid didn't know when to quit a losing situation. They were getting hammered, more than half their remaining gunships were wreckage. The other half were trying to chase down the agile fighters. Not that they could, none had the speed or maneuverability of the tiny things.

  “Sir...”

  “Shut up!” the admiral said, rounding on him. “If I want your opinion Captain, I'll give it to you!” he snarled, foam flecks on his lips.

  The Captain looked away immediately, recognizing madness.

  “Sir, Archeon has been disabled. So has Kiev and Court Intrigue. We're down to four frigates remaining.”

  “Damn. We can win this!” the admiral snarled. He clenched his fist when a couple of Cutlass's shots got through, hammering the cruiser's shields. “SEE?” he demanded.

  “Incoming! Thirty missiles incoming!” CIC reported, voice rising in near panic. They had seen what two torpedoes could do, thirty missiles?

  “Point defense! Turn her port on to the incoming missiles. Reinforce Port shields! Counter missiles fire!”

  “Blow chaff and release decoys. Helm, drop us down, emergency blow Y axis!” the Captain called. “All hands brace for impact!” he bellowed into the intercom and then held on to his armrests.

  ...*...*...*...*...

  “Damn this is lonely,” Hurt locker grumbled, looking around. She'd sent Sticks in to help Slammer since his wingman Sledge had bought it. Sticks was millions of kilometers away now. Space was vast, dark, and damn eerie when you were all alone.

  Well, not quiet alone. She was out of the battle space, but not quite in deep space. A cluster of rocks was about a thousand kilometers off to her port stern. She had come here in case she needed quick cover to go to ground in. It didn't look like it, but she liked having the option.

  Off to her starboard side, about two million kilometers out was a solar farm. Quite a big one, and from the looks of it, well maintained. The pirates hadn't shot it up too, which was a wonder.

  “Cobra 4 this is Yard dog one, need a lift?” a female voice said over the guard channel. Hurt locker looked around, confused until her HUD guided her to an incoming tug. It was coming in behind her, from the direction of the asteroids.

  “I'm, damn it, no I'm not good,” she cursed, checking her readings. Her fuel was too low and she'd just received orders to recover on the planet. That wasn't possible, the damn misfiring RCS had drained too much fuel from her.

  “I'm in the neighborhood lady, make up my mind,” Mairi said over the link.

  “Who the hell are you?” Hurt locker demanded.

  Mairi snorted. “A friend. Ever heard the expression, any port in
the storm?” she asked. She flashed her IFF in a directional burst laser at the fighter.

  “Yeah,” Hurt locker said nodding. “I'm just still classifying you as friend.” Her computer received the whisker laser and then opened the file. She scanned the brief IFF and then focused on the attached file. It was a note from one reservist first Lieutenant Warner, stating that the tug and it's pilot were on the navy side. She shrugged. She had to take a chance.

  “I am one,” Mairi replied, approaching the fighter. “The Warners sent me to lend a hand. I was hiding in the rocks.”

  “Oh?”

  “Look I'm not some damn Horathian pirate damn it, I'm with Yard Dogs. The shipyard. What's left of it anyway,” Mairi said bitterly. She waved a waldo in the direction of the yard between them and Antigua Prime station.

  Hurt locker turned, looking at the torn up scaffolding and ripped open building spaces. Some of it was still good, the ship that had been in the dock looked salvageable, but it was sure beat up something wicked. “What's been done can be undone kid.”

  “Yeah well, I just spent the better part of a year putting that tinker toy set together. I'm not happy about it getting chewed up so fast,” Mairi replied.

  “Like I said, if you can build that from scratch kid, you can fix it. I'm betting you'll get your chance soon enough.”

  “What do you need?” Mairi asked, extending a robotic arm out.

  Hurt locker winced as the arm approached her. It slowed to a stop near a universal docking port. She opened the port and the hexagonal key chuck slid in. She clamped down on it. Now they were joined. “Need a ride?” Mairi asked.

  “Actually, if you could spare some fuel...” Hurt locker suggested. “I'm supposed to recover ground side,” she said with a frown.

  The girl looked up at her from the bubble canopy and then shrugged. She had her visor up, Hurt locker could see the girl was young, a teen. “Sure, I've got fuel. They sent me out with a couple hundred tons of fuel and oxy when the pirates came in.”

  “Wait, you've been in the rocks for what, a week?”