by Olson, Ry
. . .
Prowler’s head snapped up, ears forward, whiskers fully extended. His head shifted a little bit and he uncurled into a low crouch. His head shifted again and his tail stub started to lash and shake.
Martin studied his small companion. “What do you see boy? Show me.” A display next to Martin lit up with a view of space off to the side, the view shifted several times, but Martin saw nothing. “I don’t see anything, are you sure?” Prowler gave a low growl. Panorama. Martin commanded. He was instantly floating in empty space. “Show me again fella.” Once again Martin saw nothing. “Where? I don’t see it. Highlight it.” A small red circle floated in space for a split second then jumped, hesitated and jumped again. It repeated this five times before it left sensor range. “Detail your best scan and show it to me.” Normal! Martin commanded. And he was back in his yacht. The display in front of him displayed a grainy image of a small cylinder with rounded ends, no bigger than his thumb. “Now what the hell . . . can you track and follow?” Prowler gave a low chirup. “Hunt it down fella, I think we just found part of the Koth’s new toy. Sensor range only at a hundred LK[4], don’t let it approach us.” I wanna’ watch thing for a bit. “Get us in front of it when you think you’ve got its path predicted. Tag locations.”
Martin’s ship jumped several times as he watched, then made a longer jump. The little cylinder hopped across the screen with each appearance showing as a red dot. Martin studied his navigation hologram for a second with the path of the object super imposed on it. “Good boy, fella. It’s definitely heading deeper into our space and all in all moves pretty damned fast.” Martin commanded the predicted path to appear in the hologram and traced it. The path wasn’t going to come anywhere near any Federation ships he knew of. He reached over and scratched Prowler between the ears. “Ohh, it’s cute all right, but just what in hell is it doing? Well let’s see, it’s going about a hundred LK each jump and jumping about a hundred times a minute. So that little piece of shit is covering about three light hours a minute.” Martin did a quick mental calculation. “Holy schmoly, that thing’s covering about a half a light year a day.” I only see one, but say they randomly fire off a shitload of these things . . . Martin leaned back in his seat, thinking about what was happening in the war. “Ya know Prowler, I’ve got a hunch. I bet that thing is some sort of reconnaissance drone. By itself it ain’t much, but if you send in hundreds, or even thousands, of them they would scour a lot of space in a big hurry.” But how do they work?
. . .
Rear Admiral Chinn looked up from the reports she was reading and tapped the buzzing vidphone. “Admiral Chinn.”
“Comm central, Admiral.” The unknown Major replied.
She set down the reports. “Go ahead, Major.”
“Yes Ma’am,” He glanced at a display off to the side. “We have a request from a Major Morgan aboard the Star Panther for a direct communication to the Fleet Officer on duty.”
Admiral Chinn sighed. “His authorization, Major.”
He returned a quick smile. “Off the bloom’in chart, Ma’am.”
She had to stifle a laugh, it was good to see moral was still good after the disaster the past two weeks had been. She smiled. “Thank you Major, patch him through.”
“Will do, Ma’am.” He gave a quick nod and disappeared.
Admiral Chinn fidgeted for a second as the connection was made. We’re getting shot to shit out here and some hot shot Major has the authority to contact the Fleet Commander directly without going through the chain of command. The thought was still born as the authorizations rolled down her screen. Whoa, that Major Morgan. She felt a slight tingle of apprehension remembering the memo she had received on this warborg and his ship . . . and their mission. A shaky heartbeat later a pleasant face appeared on her vidphone.
“Major Morgan reporting , Ss . . . Ma’am.” His face was relaxed.
She let out a sigh of relief at his calm demeanor. “Admiral Chinn here, what can we do for you Major?”
“Ma’am, I’m tracking a single bogey that is headed into your sector.”
The apprehension came roaring back. “Go ahead , Major. I’m listening. What kind of bogey?”
Martin sighed. “I wish I knew Admiral.” He fed through the display of the cylinder.”
She studied the image for a few seconds wanting to yell at this Major for bothering her with this piece of nonsense with everything else that was going on. She took a deep breath and regained her composure. “I assume you give this find some importance.”
Martin fed through all the data he had. “Yes Ma’am. I think it’s a reconnaissance drone of some sort.”
She scrolled through the data. Well, he is thorough. Her eyebrows shot up and she scrolled back to the physical description. “This thing is tiny!”
“Yes Ma’am, and quiet. The only reason we spotted it is because we were running silent. Even then Prowler, sorry, he’s my AI companion, was the one who noted it. I would never have seen it.”
Chinn had to fight off a momentary shiver. These cyborgs are SO strange, an AI companion? “Still Major, I don’t believe one could have gotten by a surveillance ship undetected.”
Martin nodded. “That was my thought also. But then it hit me, we don’t run those ships deep in our own space.”
She shrugged, then sagged a little as she understood what he was going to say. “Son of a bitch. So they sneak into our space, fire off a bunch of these things and sneak back.”
“Yep, and they’re so damn quiet one could flitter right through the middle of your fleet and you’d be none the wiser.” He shot her a questioning half smile.
“Aww, for cryin’ in the beer.” She seethed. “There could be thousands of these little turds running around and we’d be none the wiser.”
Martin laughed, he liked this officer.
Admiral Chinn smiled in embarrassment over her outburst. “Sorry, Major.”
“Fer what? Being human?” He gave a loose chuckle. “Welcome aboard, Ma’am.”
She studied the amiable face in the vidphone. You must have been one hell of a man, Major. This was no ordinary officer, she could feel it.
She frowned. “Okay, you’re tracking this little bugger, so now what do we do?”
“We need to know how it works. There’s nothing in its path, so we need to put something there and watch what it does.” He nodded to her for any suggestions.
. . .
“Decoy squadrons jump.” Admiral Chinn’s voice commanded.
The two groups of warborg strikes disappeared instantly.
“Are you sure they came through, Admiral?” The senior squadron leader asked. “We didn’t see a thing.”
“Yes Major, both the bogey and our ship went through about a half klick from you.” Admiral Chinn responded, noting with satisfaction the two groups of warborgs had reappeared in normal space twenty thousand klicks from where they had been.
Thirty seconds later several dozen Koth fighters appeared. The warborgs vanished from the area without a fight.
. . .
The senior squadron leader looked at those around him in the hardlink. ^Well, now we’re fighting ghosts and ambushes. Just great.^
^Yeah, but remember Jeff, one of those ghosts was one of us.^ Another spoke up.
They all broke the link in deep thought. It was a whole new ball game and they didn’t know the rules yet.
. . .
Martin watched Prowler, marveling at how much he could read from his buddy’s body language. They followed the cylinder through seemingly endless jumps waiting for the one he hoped would make it respond. He watched in silence as they drew closer to the two squadrons of fighters, he could pick them up several jumps before they got there. He involuntarily held his breath as they flashed through his close range sensors. They followed the cylinder through the next jump. But this time it didn’t jump, it floated in space for a few seconds then detonated. “Well that sucks.” Martin slumped in his seat. Follow the little
turd all over hell and gone and it blows itself up in the middle of nowhere. Real effective weapon guys. He sat in silence waiting to see if anything else happened. His vidphone buzzed.
“Morgan here.”
Admiral Chinn’s excited face lit up the screen. “Tell me you saw something.”
“Why? What happened?” He sputtered.
“About two dozen Koth fighters showed up right on schedule, right on target.”
“What?” Martin stared at her face. “Nothing happened, the little piece of junk took one more jump then blooey. It blew itself up. End of story.”
She drooped a little. “So you never picked up a transmission from it of any kind?”
“Not a twitch. Damn.” Martin sighed in exasperation and reached over to scratch Prowler. He looked at his cat and chuckled. “Hey Admiral, you ever have a cat or dog?”
She looked confused. “Sure, we had both while I grew up. Why?”
“Ever seen them smile?”
“Yeah, all the time.” She gazed at Martin wondering about his sanity for thinking about that at a time like this.
“Well,” he gave her a wink, “you see I got a cat here grinning from ear to ear. He caught his self a mouse and is damned proud of it.”
22: CHECK!
Martin looked around at the others in the meeting. He was by far the junior officer present, and the only other cyborg was Commander Briton. He and Briton attended the meeting by looking on from displays in opposite walls. His attention went back to the Admiral from Intelligence.
The Admiral hesitated as a projection of a very complex curve appeared in the holodisplay. “This is the subspace distortion curve generated by the first micro-drone when it self destructed. It’s actually a highly modified FTL field signature. Since then we have managed to find and track two more of the devices. Utilizing the same technique from the first encounter we triggered them.”
Two more curves appeared in the holodisplay. One was very similar to the first, but the second was noticeably different.
The Admiral highlighted the similar one. “This was the second encounter and we used exactly the same tactic, it was allowed to identify two squadrons of warborg strikes.” He highlighted the third curve. “This time the device was headed toward a small battle group of mixed missile cruisers and fighter bases. We let nature take its course and jumped the entire group as soon as the device passed through. As you can see this curve is noticeably different from the other two. Twenty five seconds later an overwhelming Koth attack fleet appeared in the area.” The Admiral nodded toward Martin’s display. “So apparently Major, your initial deduction was correct. The micro-drone self destruction emits a subspace data burst that not only establishes a location, but some reasonable detail of what was detected.” The Admiral sighed. “Also thank you Major, as I said the third device would have picked up the battle group on its own and that would have been a disaster without prior warning it was coming.”
“Sir.” Commander Briton injected.
“Yes, Commander.” The Admiral nodded toward Briton’s display.
“Do we have any idea why my group was scouted by the Koth strike fighters prior to the attack?”
The Admiral sucked his front teeth for a second. “No, not really. There have been a few postulations ranging from it was a freak occurrence, once in a while normal reconnaissance operations do hit pay dirt, to the device was not as sophisticated as these or it malfunctioned somehow.” He shook his head.
Commander Briton gave a quick nod. “Thank you, Sir.”
“So the question now, is what are we going to do about this latest development?” The Admiral asked in general, throwing the floor open for suggestions.
“We have to defang this threat.” Admiral Chinn stated. “I propose we set a trap.”
“Hmmm, that would make them leery of using them.” Another Fleet Commander added. “So we’re only going to get one shot at this. When they realize we’re on to the micro drones it will be a lot harder to draw them in.”
Admiral Chinn nodded. “I suspect you’re right, so this has to be a big, nasty beast . . . with a heavy price tag if we mess up.”
Martin listened to the others formulate a plan and observed in quiet amazement as the sheer massiveness of the trap became apparent. “Sirs?” Martin asked quietly during a lull in the conversation.
“Yes, Major.” The Intelligence Admiral responded.
Martin felt a momentary apprehension at being the center of attention from all the high ranking officers. “If we make the operation this big we’d best be ready for their wildcard. If they send in the killer ship and we’re not ready for it . . . that would be devastating.”
The meeting fell eerily silent. Finally the Intelligence officer spoke. “Thank you Major, calling having a third of all the fighting ships in sector destroyed in seconds devastating is a vast understatement.” He looked around at the others and seemed deflated. “What DO we DO if that son-of-a-bitch shows up?”
“Run.” An anonymous voice ventured. The room filled with nervous laughter.
. . .
Admiral Chinn felt like someone was twisting an ice cold knife in her gut as she watched the progress of the Koth micro-drone. It had taken two days to find one and they had been painstakingly tracking it since while they gathered the battle group. All of the fleets had sent ships, mainly warborgs, over the past seventy two hours and now they were ready. She gazed at the decoy fleet of four hundred mixed ships, alone this was an incredibly powerful battle group. But the thought of the eight hundred plus fighting ships hanging in space just out of sensor range was mind boggling.
“ETA, two minutes.” The anonymous voice droned over the fleet comm system.
“All groups prepare for battle.” Her voice didn’t sound as shaky as she felt. She noticed her white knuckles from gripping the arms of her command seat and shook out her hands. An aide gave her a re-assuring wink and a nervous smile. She pursed her lips and tried to smile back. The chatter from the battle channels was tense and quiet.
“ETA, ninety seconds.”
It took two days to find one of the damn things, then three hours ago a group had to dodge one. She felt her anxiety roll up another notch. So many, so much . . . too much. One little glitch and it’s over, maybe literally. She took a huge breath and slowly blew it out.
“ETA, sixty seconds.”
She forced an involuntary shiver aside and clicked on a comm channel. “Commander Briton, you now have warborg battle command.”
“Affirmative, I now have command.” Briton’s voice came back sounding relaxed and confident.
Admiral Chinn shook her head slightly. It’s just so strange knowing that one of my battle commanders is floating around out there in a strike fighter with a wingman instead of sitting at a command post in a flagship. She felt a stab of envy. Just like the ancient times when the leader would charge into battle with his warriors. I know he isn’t going to engage in the fight, but just knowing that you could.
“ETA, thirty seconds.”
Chinn clicked on a general command comm channel. “This is Admiral Chinn, all ships hold position. Surveillance ships report into Fleet Command comm.” In thirty seconds I’m going to trigger a battle with so much firepower that it makes any other battle in the history of mankind look like a gnat fart. Strangely she had a thought of Martin floating around out there somewhere in undetected silence and somehow it made her feel a little better. GOD, I don’t want to do this. She gritted her teeth. How many hundreds, maybe thousands are going die in the next five minutes. She bit her lips together and her stomach was an agony of wet knotted rope.
“ETA, ten seconds.”
“All ships initiate phase one on my mark . . . and God speed.” The comm links were absolutely silent. May God forgive me.
. . .
“. . . and God Speed.” Admiral Chinn’s voice was steady, but with an edge as it came through the comm link.
Hang tough, Milady, was Briton’s fleeting thought as
he studied his forces. ^Everybody hold position through phase one.^ He commanded over an open voice only hardlink to all his fighters. ^Everyone into position on my command, jump.^
“All comm silent.” Chinn ordered over the command channel.
Briton sat waiting apprehensively in the eerie silence.
“Contact.” The droning countdown voice sounded like a shout in the silence.
“We have a pulse. We have a pulse.” An other anonymous female voice calmly reported from a surveillance ship as if she were giving the weather.
“Mark.” Admiral Chinn barked over the command channel.
Fifteen seconds to get twelve hundred ships in position and establish the IFF[5] net, this should be . . . interesting. Briton thought as the decoy fleet disappeared. ^JUMP!^
. . .
Martin watched with clinical interest as the decoy ships repositioned and were re-enforced a second later when three hundred warborg fighters blinked into existence. Within a few heartbeats the rest of the force was in position. The view from Martin’s vantage point was stunning. A tumulus collage of three hundred warborgs a hundred klicks across held center stage. Five hundred klicks out a loose constellation of eight hundred manned fighters formed a shell around the warborgs. Just beyond the manned fighters almost a hundred missile cruisers roved . . . anchored by thirteen strategically placed heavy battle cruisers.
