by Tori Harris
Chapter 5
TFS Theseus, Location Dagger
(3.3 light years from Earth)
“Should we press on with our attack on the Baldev?” Reynolds asked.
“For now, yes,” Prescott replied. “Assuming Waffer’s Badger 21 Flight remains on station to cover her stern, Zhukov still has a total of forty-eight fighters and six RPSVs at his disposal. I suspect he’ll find a way to take down Charlie 4 directly. If he can’t, we may not fare much better ourselves. Tactical, slave our remaining twelve Hunters to Badger 21 Flight. There’s no need to expose them to enemy fire at this point. Once we start this run, we need you to take down as many of those new aft shield emitters as you can. I don’t expect this is going to be pleasant, so let’s try to minimize the number of runs needed, if possible. Helm, straight at Bravo 1’s stern, please.”
Before the three officers even had time to acknowledge the order, Theseus surged forward as Fisher rapidly advanced her sublight engines to full power. For the first time since transitioning out of Ingenuity, the bridge crew felt themselves being pushed back in their seats as the ship’s inertial dampening systems lagged slightly behind her acceleration curve.
“Lieutenant Lee, how do we avoid more of those low angle of incidence shots that tend get past our shields … assuming the Baldev starts firing at some point, that is?” Prescott asked.
“We will need to develop a profile of each ship’s firing pattern so that we can avoid putting ourselves in a position where incoming fire hits our shields at angles approaching the perpendicular, sir,” Lieutenant Lee answered from the Science and Engineering console. “We probably won’t be able to avoid that situation completely, but our data will improve every time they fire. Captain Zhukov’s last attack run did a pretty good job of fleshing out Charlie 4’s aft firing pattern, for example. When we start taking fire, the AI will provide the helm console with a graphical indication of where we should avoid flying, if possible. In general, we should avoid passing directly over or under the target and try to keep our course line from pointing directly at their main weapons banks.”
“Thank you, Lieutenant. That’s good info, although it sounds a little like dodging raindrops during a thunderstorm,” he chuckled. “You heard him, Fisher, we need you to modify the definition of ‘straight at ‘em’ just a bit. Alter your course line to avoid perpendicular fire, as often as you possibly can.”
“Aye, sir, I’ll do my best,” the young helmsman replied noncommittally.
“I’m sure we’ll be fine. As soon as our weapons no longer bear on the target’s stern, C-Jump clear and set us up for another run.”
“Optimal weapons range in two five seconds, Captain,” Lieutenant Commander Schmidt reported from Tactical 1.
“Very good. Lau, I need you to pound the hell out of those emitters with penetration rounds from the railguns. Hopefully, they will still be able to get through the added shielding. Schmidt, try a point location attack with a full spread of torpedoes and energy weapons.”
“We could sure use the Navajo’s big guns right about now,” Reynolds muttered to herself.
“For the moment, we’ve got the biggest guns Fleet has to offer our here, Commander. But if we can blunt their attack and force them to withdraw from the system —”
“Then if and when they do come back, things will be different,” she concluded.
“I hope so, yes. With any luck, our carriers and cruisers will be able to join us if we have to face the Resistance again … or whoever else decides to show up, God forbid. For now, though, it’s up to us to find a way to stop them, or at least convince them that an attack on Earth is more trouble than it’s worth.”
Prescott glanced over at the tactical plot, noting that the AI was automatically emphasizing Theseus’ optimal weapons range by surrounding the ship with a green circle. As the edge of their range bubble rapidly approached Bravo 1, he saw that the AI was also displaying a corresponding estimate of the battleship’s weapons range. Just as Commander Waffer had noted, his ship had been within the Baldev’s range since their attack run began. Why the hell aren’t they firing? he thought, suddenly feeling the hair stand on the back of his neck.
“Optimal weapons range reached,” Lau reported. “Firing.”
At that moment, nine of the destroyer’s fifteen railgun turrets were in a position to target the battleship’s drive section, and all nine now spewed forth steady streams composed of tens of thousands of penetrator rounds flying at nearly ten percent the speed of light. Based on the firing pattern selected by Lieutenant Lau, Theseus’ AI attempted to converge the outbound railgun fire into two separate streams, slowly tracing each around the perimeter of the drive section in an effort to destroy as many shield emitters as possible. Although not entirely effective at stopping the incoming railgun rounds, the heavy shielding in place over the Baldev’s stern still interacted with each one as it approached the hull, reducing its velocity and causing a significant percentage of the rounds to miss their target entirely. Without the shields, the fusillade would have easily transformed most of the warship’s stern into a glowing mass of molten metal as each individual round delivered its destructive cargo of kinetic energy to the target.
Simultaneously, Lieutenant Schmidt had initiated his attack against a two-meter by two-meter target near the edge of several overlapping emitter streams that, according to Theseus’ AI, corresponded to the lowest mean field strength of any location on the battleship’s stern. Using a technique reminiscent of an artillery tactic developed in the mid twentieth century known as Multiple Rounds, Simultaneous Impact (MRSI), the destructive power of multiple weapon systems were coordinated by the ship’s AI to converge at a single location at a precise moment in time. Accordingly, as Schmidt gave the command to fire, the AI intentionally delayed the discharge of its energy weapons until its salvo of five plasma torpedoes had reached just over two-thirds of the distance to the target. With just two one-thousandths of a second remaining until impact, fully half of the destroyer’s readily available power was shunted to its energy weapons, delivering a maximum power discharge from the twenty-five beam emitter locations currently bearing on the targeted location. Just as it had done with its railgun turrets, Theseus’ AI took into account the locations of the emitters in play, allowing the individual beams to converge at the designated point of impact.
With Badger 21 Flight remaining aft of their target, Theseus received continuous streams of data from several different locations, presenting its crew with a detailed assessment of the damage they had inflicted — even after the target’s drive section was no longer visible from their location. Real-time light and thermally enhanced imagery of the Baldev’s stern was immediately presented on the bridge view screen, with the effect on the target’s shields highlighted on the tactical assessment display. The results, while hardly catastrophic for the colossal battleship, were better than expected.
“Captain, we took out several of the new shield emitters down the starboard side of Bravo 1’s drive section,” Lau reported. “The additional shielding is still in place, but it looks like we forced their AI to modify its configuration to compensate for the damage.”
“C-Jumping,” Ensign Fisher reported as Theseus concluded her first attack run and altered course to avoid passing directly beneath the huge battleship. As his practiced hands quickly executed the required commands, a series of unfamiliar, but urgent-sounding warning tones issued from the Helm console. “Uh, sir …”
Outside, with Theseus now at her closest approach, energy weapons fire burst forth from what looked like hundreds of locations across the entire starboard and ventral surfaces of the Baldev.
“Fisher, emergency C-Jump!” Prescott yelled, the normally controlled tone of his voice deserting him entirely. In the background, the sound of the ship’s reactors and sublight engines also rose sharply as she attempted to fend off the massive torrent of incoming fire.
“I’m trying, but I’m getting some kind of field integrity fault
that I’ve never seen before … the C-Drive is offline, sir!” he replied in near panic.
With little else any of them could do at the moment, the entire bridge crew held its collective breath, each person sending nervous glances in Fisher’s direction as they silently willed their ship to complete its C-Jump. For the next several seconds, his hands moved frantically across the surface of the Helm console as he continued his vain attempts to transition the ship while simultaneously executing a series of high-speed evasive maneuvers.
“Bridge, Engineering,” Commander Logan’s voice boomed from the overhead speakers.
“Prescott. Go, Commander!”
“We are being bombarded by a focused gravitic beam with a waveform that looks a lot like what our inertial dampeners produce. It’s not enough to cause hull damage, but it’s more than sufficient to prevent our hyperdrive from creating a field that’s stable enough for a transition.”
“I need options, Logan.”
“For now, we just need to run!” his chief engineer replied in an uncharacteristically urgent tone. “We’re way too close to be able to count on our shields to protect us.”
As if to underscore Logan’s point, Theseus shook violently with multiple impacts as several of the Baldev’s bolts of focused, orange-tinted energy managed to avoid being intercepted by the destroyer’s shields, instantly vaporizing sections of her outer hull armor.
Without further prompting, Ensign Fisher selected a course indicated by the AI to minimize the potential for shield penetrations, then pushed the ship’s Cannae sublight engines to emergency power, temporarily allowing them to deliver twenty percent more thrust than their design maximum. Theseus responded without hesitation, accelerating away from the battleship in a tight arc as if it were a stationary target.
“Warning, initiate Anti-G Straining Maneuver to prevent G-induced loss of consciousness,” the ship’s AI announced.
“AI, Prescott. Discontinue G-force warnings,” he ordered impatiently. Out of habit, he had begun tensing the muscles in his legs and abdomen as soon as his helmsman had started the series of aggressive turns. “Watch the Gs, everyone,” he grunted, trying to sound more in control of the situation. “We can’t afford to have anyone passing out right now.”
“I guess we just found Admiral Naftur’s gravitic beam weapon,” Logan continued over the intercom, resuming normal breathing as the ship stabilized on its new course.
“Maybe so,” Prescott said. “Let’s hope that’s the only trick they have up their sleeve. Any idea what kind of range we’re talking about?”
“Not really, no. The Baldev has a number of heavy gravitic emitters mounted at various locations on her hull, so I can’t even tell you at the moment which ones are responsible for the beam,” he replied, sending a high resolution image of several examples to the bridge view screen. “But I will take a wild guess that they have a pretty substantial range … probably a few hundred thousand kilometers at least. If they didn’t, I can’t imagine there would be much point in mounting them on a warship in the first place. I can also tell you that she has arrays like the ones I just sent you on both her ventral and dorsal surfaces, so we’re unlikely to find much of a ‘dead zone’ where they can’t hit us.”
“Thank you, Commander. Keep the shields up and the engines running, please.”
“As if my life depended on it, Captain. Logan out.”
“Sir, Charlie 4 is firing on us now as well,” Schmidt reported from Tactical 1, “but so far, she doesn’t appear to be giving chase.”
“Insult to injury at this point,” he replied, glancing up at the hull impacts counter below the tactical plot, which now stood at thirteen. The ship had taken six additional hits to its hull thus far since beginning its attack run against the Baldev. Fortunately, with the distance between the Theseus and the two remaining enemy ships rapidly increasing, her shields had once again become highly effective at deflecting the incoming fire. “Helm, I think it goes without saying, but get us as far away from that battleship as you can, as fast as you can, and as soon as you get a stable hyperdrive field, execute your C-Jump.”
“Aye, Captain,” Fisher replied, still rapidly entering commands at the Helm console.
Even with the Keturah now sending a sizable fraction of her considerable firepower in their direction, the intensity of the incoming energy weapons fire had lessened somewhat from what it had been just moments ago. With Theseus’ stern now facing the enemy ships, shield intercept events continued to occur at a rapid pace behind the destroyer as she streaked out of the area. Each interaction with an incoming bolt of energy produced a brief flash of light in the visible spectrum, resulting in a ghostly, white glow that seemed to ebb and flow like flashes of lightning revealing a whitecapped, following sea.
“Okay,” Reynolds said, looking up from her touchscreen, “the AI had originally misidentified the Baldev’s gravitic weapon as a problem with our own field generators. The good news is that the effects of the weapon are relatively easy for us to detect since we have an extensive network of sensors in place to monitor the various gravitic systems we use onboard. From now on, the tactical plot should display a warning indicator when we detect the beam. The Helm console’s C-Drive interface should also display the same warning and trip the flags indicating that hyperspace transitions are unavailable. You can see them now, right Ensign Fisher?”
“Yes, ma’am. Got it. Thank you.”
“Good work, Commander. Tactical, range to the Baldev, please?” Prescott asked.
“One niner zero thousand kilometers, Captain,” Schmidt replied. “Just passing .05 c and still accelerating.”
“I’m going to be optimistic and venture a guess that we’ll be able to transition to hyperspace once our range exceeds three hundred thousand kilometers.”
“I’m not so sure about that, sir,” Reynolds replied. “It apparently doesn’t take much interference to prevent the hyperdrive from doing its thing. I’m thinking more like double that. It’s a good thing Bravo 1 can’t come after us. They’re pretty much hamstrung as long as our fighters are covering their stern.”
“Dammit!” Prescott swore under his breath, realizing that he had neglected to update the fighter squadrons regarding Theseus’ status. “Badger flights, Theseus-Actual.”
“Badger 1 … Badger 2,” Zhukov and Waffer replied in their typical, businesslike tone.
“I’m not sure how much of our situation you were able to piece together over the past couple of minutes, but the purpose of the gravitic beam Admiral Naftur warned us about is to prevent a ship from transitioning to hyperspace. They’ve been hitting us with it ever since we finished our attack run. We are unable to C-Jump at the moment, but believe we should be able to do so once again after we put sufficient distance between ourselves and the Baldev. The presence of Badger 21 Flight off their stern does appear to be forcing them to keep their supplemental shields engaged — and that, in turn, prevents their giving chase. Since I’m pretty sure coming after us is something they would very much like to do, I believe you should expect that they will focus their attention on you once we transition out of the area.”
“Badger flights copy. Be advised that we are still showing an operational status on all of our C-Drives, so they may only have the capability to target one ship at a time. What are your intentions, Captain?” Zhukov asked.
“Glad to hear it. Assuming we can clear their grav beam, we intend to C-Jump thirty light seconds downrange, take a quick look at the battle damage assessment, then set up for another attack run on Bravo 1’s stern.”
“Range to Bravo 1 now three zero zero thousand kilometers,” Schmidt updated in the background.
“Sir, if I may,” Waffer interjected, “our AI has been chewing on the data from your attack run and it looks like it was significantly more effective than our models predicted. I believe if you execute the same type of attack against Charlie 4, you will at the very least succeed in bringing down her shields so that we can finish her off. Y
ou may even destroy her outright. That gets us back to our original plan of being able to focus everything we have left on Bravo 1.”
Prescott glanced at his XO, who nodded her emphatic agreement under raised eyebrows. “Alright, Badger flights, we’ll go with your suggestion. We won’t be gone long once we C-Jump, so be ready to back us up once we return to start our next attack run. By the same token, don’t hesitate to C-Jump away yourselves if you come under fire.”
“Will do, Theseus, Badgers out.”
“Captain, Commander Waffer is definitely right about our attack,” Lau said from Tactical 2. “I was so focused on taking down shield emitters that I didn’t really notice the results of Lieutenant Commander Schmidt’s ordinance until now. Bravo 1’s aft shields remained intact overall — other than the supplemental field reconfiguration I mentioned earlier — but our point location attack seems to have placed so much energy in one spot that some of it managed to impact her hull.”
“That’s very good news, Lieutenant. Did we do any damage?”
“C-Jumping,” Fisher interrupted from the Helm console.
“And that’s even better news,” Prescott chuckled.
The sound of the destroyer’s reactors decreased in volume as the rate of shield intercept events instantly decreased from hundreds per minute to zero. With the Resistance warships now just over nine million kilometers astern, Ensign Fisher finally decreased power to the sublight engines and began the process of decelerating in a wide arc that would ultimately head them back in the direction of the battle.
