Strike Battleship Engineers (The Ithis Campaign Book 2)

by Shane Lochlann Black

  “Ma’am, I–” Islington cut her engineer off with a raised hand.

  “Does that mean what I think it means, XO?”

  “Affirmative. In seventeen minutes Argent goes down trailing fire for a thousand miles.”

  Brogan’s scanner lit up. He examined it for a moment, made an adjustment and scanned the readouts again.

  “Life signs, ma’am.”

  “Argent crew?”

  “Negative. Not human.”

  Fourteen

  Zony Tixia had long since cataloged the sudden appearance of two look-down probes at a range of 18 miles at a bearing of 341 degrees true. They were deployed in a stand-off configuration with one high to monitor the lower unit. That could only mean someone at the crash site was interested in keeping potential enemies away, and that meant there had to be survivors.

  What was troubling was so far there had been no response to any of Zony’s hails. Either there was some kind of very subtle jamming going on or there was something unique happening at the current position of Copernicus One. Automatic systems were generally barred from launching probes because of the potential safety issues, so if anything had been deployed, it had to be by the command of human personnel. Argent had also reappeared in the southern sky, and all of Zony’s datalinks had been restored, at least for the time being.

  But what had the lieutenant’s attention at the moment were the life signs she had detected on her handheld scanner. They were reading at a solid five by five reception on a bearing of eight degrees true at a range of just over three miles from Zony’s position. Three were human. The fourth was indeterminate and seemed to be fluctuating. That presented a couple of possibilities. One was the fourth was injured or unconscious. The second was interference, which wouldn’t be surprising considering Zony had already defeated two hostiles.

  The third possibility was that none of the four readings were friendly. If that were the case, they were likely reading Zony’s position just as easily. She reflexively checked her weapon and began to advance on the target axial. It would be child’s play to get a look at whomever it was if she had full access to Argent’s on-board systems, but her datalink only gave her partial control of voice communications. So far Argent had not responded to any of her voice or distress contact attempts. All the information she had gathered so far had been from automated response systems. It was tremendously useful, but it didn’t give her any idea of Argent’s real status. She was beginning to doubt her radio silence theory, since no rescue had apparently been mounted yet. If Copernicus One did, in fact, crash hours before, there should have long since been a medical ship and a fighter escort on the scene.

  She briefly considered and then rejected redeploying one of the Copernicus look-down probes. If they were set up to protect the boat, interfering with their operation could put the survivors at risk. No, this one she was going to have to do on her own. Getting past four possible hostile life forms in order to get back to the boat without being detected would be a stroke of luck far beyond any reasonable odds. If they were hostile, she would have to neutralize the threat before she made any attempt to return to the crash site.

  She drew her weapon, set her handheld to broadcast a high-power ECM field and began her advance towards the position of the unidentified life signs.

  Fifteen

  “Okay, I’m thinking of a color, and it’s not yellow this time!” Aibreann scolded with a delighted tone in her voice. “Now you guess!”

  “Is it blue?” Dominique asked.

  “Nope.” Aibreann shook her head, her face bright with her smile.

  “Is it green?”

  “Nope!”

  As the command computer cycled through all of its available choices, it was busy compiling probability matrices for each attempt to guess the young girl’s mystery color. That activity was bringing more and more processors online to attack the problem. Little progress had been made until Aibreann had come up with a scoring system. The command computer’s executive process correctly recognized that a higher score indicated positive progress, so its partially functioning neural gestalt focused on the task of maximizing that number. Its goal was partially to please Aibreann and partially to try and win the game.

  “Is it purple?”

  “Uh-uh!”

  As a result, the command computer had restored more than 14% of its readiness capacity in the space of a few hours. Dominique’s avatar-like presence aboard the crashed vessel was gradually approaching a point where it was capable of operating vital systems on its own.

  “Dominique, I feel funny.”

  “Funny. The definition of that word does not correlate with any known biological or pathological condition in humans. Please clarify.”

  “You always say smart things.” Aibreann’s voice wavered. She started to hold intonations longer, making her words run together.

  “Is it brown?”

  “Idonknow...” Suddenly the girl yawned and reacted as if surprised she was so tired. “I’m dizzy.” She looked back and forth for a moment very much like someone who was disoriented and unable to figure out where they were. Then she picked up her life support monitor.

  It displayed an urgently blinking red number four. Somewhere in Aibreann’s mind she experienced atavistic fear and shock at the same time, but she didn’t have the strength to react. Her muscles spasmed uncontrollably. How come it’s only four? It was 97 only a little while ago, she thought. She was suddenly so tired. So very, very tired.

  “Oh no... I have to go home. My air is running out. I have to go. I have to–” Her voice faded. She gradually lost consciousness and slumped in the pilot’s shock couch. She dropped her doll. The flight helmet slid down to nearly cover her face.

  “Is it pink?”

  There was no response.

  “Is it pink?”

  Dominique was confused. Without an answer to her question there was no way to tell if she was making progress in the guessing game, nor was there any way of knowing if she had been awarded more points.

  “I am unable to determine the results of the game. Shall I end program?”

  No response.

  Dominique’s confusion at the non-answers caused a formerly quiescent subsystem to activate deep inside the command computer’s core programming. The new process immediately queried main memory for the conditions that led to its activation, much like a cybernetic detective trying to gather evidence from an abandoned crime scene. Since the only other active personality Dominique had interacted with in several hours was Aibreann, the deck alert subsystem spent a little under 0.7 seconds parsing and analyzing all the possible permutations resulting from everything the young girl had said and done since the moment she had first introduced herself to the command computer.

  It took the system only another 0.2 seconds to direct focus to her last four complete sentences.

  “I’m dizzy.”

  “I have to go home.”

  “My air is running out.”

  “I have to go.”

  Her statement that her air was running out caused the deck alert subsystem to release control to the battle computer. The vessel’s systems immediately shifted to an attack posture, primarily to protect little Aibreann.

  Aboard any Skywatch warship, gunship or fighter, any variation on a crew member’s verbal observation regarding a potential life support event was set to immediately activate a series of defensive protocols to respond to potential sabotage, decompression or malfunction and to preserve the lives of any personnel in immediate danger, civilian or other.

  What ultimately saved Aibreann from suffocating was a confused Dominique’s incorrect initial assumption that the nine-year-old was the ship’s command pilot. That made her a crew member, and that meant her observation about her air running out would naturally activate the ship’s defenses.

  Life support, medical and battery operation were the only three total override systems aboard any Skywatch vessel. Absent direct orders from an authorized command offic
er, and a corresponding hardware override, those three systems had unconditional and absolute priority over every other system aboard any ship or boat without exception.

  The battle computer performed a priority diagnostic of all systems aboard the Command Wing Tarantula-Hawk gunship known as the Black Seven. It instantly and correctly noted most of its crew was missing, which activated its emergency condition overrides. This was to be expected. Skywatch fleet orders of battle rarely, if ever, placed T-Hawks in defensive roles. While Paladin multi-role surface attack craft and Yellowjacket fighters might occasionally be sent to “guard” a ground position or to escort another ship, a T-Hawk’s primary function was the “hunter-killer” role: A role it was over-engineered for at every possible level.

  Black Seven’s battle computer was unable to get coherent responses from its datalink to Argent, which it concluded partially explained the malfunction of the command computer. A shipwide diagnostic cycle completed in just under 28 seconds. All outer ports were sealed and the vessel’s interior was sealed as rapidly as possible without jeopardizing the young life in the pilot’s shock couch. Emergency medical systems took comprehensive stock of Aibreann’s vital signs. She was unconscious, but now that the vessel’s interior was pressurized and climate controlled, she was no longer in any danger of hypoxia or having an adverse reaction to the ambient exterior temperature, which was 41 degrees Fahrenheit and dropping rapidly.

  Outside, it was long past dark. The gunship’s engines began a power buildup. Rotating red and white surface and landing lights flashed at odd angles across the rocky surfaces around the vessel’s crash site. The battle computer attempted to right the vessel’s orientation, only to find it was obstructed by hard surfaces and tightly packed dirt where the starboard wing had impacted the ground after the gunship lost altitude. A rapid analysis of the outer structure was performed, and it was determined the ship’s hull integrity was well within tolerances. After verifying all power systems were online and functioning properly, the battle computer reported to the command systems the Black Seven was at 92% combat readiness.

  Another attempt to use maneuvering thrusters to lift the ship back into proper orientation relative to the planet’s surface failed, so the battle computer activated the necessary systems to begin applying force against the obstruction. A terrifying whine sounded from the ship’s atmospheric turbines, and the power surge caused the ground to tremble for hundreds of feet in every direction.

  A shock harness lowered into place and wrapped itself around little Aibreann’s shoulders. The assembly settled into the couch frame and secured her against the shock surface as part of the gunship’s preparation for liftoff. Outside, the backblast from the twin interstellar navigational engines had already stripped the very color off the rocks for a good sixty yards aft of the vessel’s trailing anti-electronic surfaces.

  Still obstructed by tons of rock and debris, the battle computer finally decided to force the issue once and for all. A moment’s preparation was followed by a thundering explosion as Black Seven activated its battle screens and interstellar drive field. More than 160 tons of rock exploded skyward and ripped trees out of the ground for nearly a hundred yards in every direction. The lethal spaceframe hovered to a level altitude of ninety feet and pivoted on its vertical axis to re-establish navigational bearings along the surface of Bayone Three. Its running lights continued flashing and blinking as the ventral and wingtip globes rotated and glowed for the benefit of ground personnel. With the exception of the stars and the relatively dim moonlight coming from Bayone Three’s handful of small natural satellites, the gunship’s running lights were the only things visible in the night sky.

  Scarcely a half-mile away, a small group of villagers had been caught unprepared for the roaring explosion of sound and ground tremors beyond Starhaven’s perimeter fence. They were carrying small lanterns and looking for Aibreann. They had no idea what was happening beyond the edge of the settlement.

  Black Seven abruptly rose to an altitude of 400 feet: High enough to establish LOS to the villagers’ position. Anti-personnel weapons systems locked IR targeting beams on all 11 people at once. Ground lamps activated and the sky exploded into a veritable ocean of painfully white light.

  Several of the villagers cried out, then stumbled back and fell. Most of them dropped what they were carrying. It was like ten suns had suddenly appeared out of thin air. Some held their hands up to try and shield their faces, but it did them no good. The light burned to the point where even closing their eyes wasn’t enough to lessen the intensity. Black Seven’s surface warfare scanners swept the entire LZ in a matter of seconds and immediately determined these particular humans were not a threat. The battle computer returned its anti-personnel weapons systems to stand-by.

  Dominique’s strident soprano voice boomed from overhead, easily audible all the way back to the farms. Several of the villagers covered their ears and closed their eyes tightly.

  “Attention unidentified civilian personnel. You have entered the command zone of a Skywatch fleet combat spacecraft. This is a restricted area. A battle alert is in effect and there may be enemy personnel in the vicinity. You are in danger if you remain at these coordinates. Please evacuate to the nearest safe area immediately. Deadly force is authorized.”

  Black Seven’s battle computer immediately broadcast an automated planet-wide all-channels hostile action bulletin and then armed its primary missiles and cannon. The shadowy vessel unfolded like an angry scorpion. It pitched forward fifteen degrees and engaged its atmospheric maneuvering engines. It roared over the position of the small company of cowering people and accelerated into the distance. The apocalyptic thunder faded, leaving the villagers pale and staring. Moments later the red running lights vanished over the southern horizon.

  Aibreann’s head lolled against her shoulder as the battle computer altered the gunship’s course. It was reacting to something else the young girl had said, and because of the battle alert, it was taking Aibreann’s words both literally and as a command directive.

  “I have to go home.”

  The Black Seven brought all its systems to full power. The vessel accelerated to a breakaway velocity of 40 miles a second before rolling out of its escape track and setting an orbital approach course towards what it considered “home.”

  The battleship DSS Argent.

  Sixteen

  Lieutenant Yili Curtiss had to admit she was proud of her grubby little helpers. Their work wasn’t pretty by any stretch of the imagination, but they had the Copernicus main reactor back to seven percent power output, which was enough to power life support if something could be done about the hull breach.

  Using the directional cameras on her little team of trundlebots, Yili was able to get a rudimentary view of the mechanisms connected to the port energy transfer relays. She had chosen this particular system because it would give her the maximum amount of information about the status of the unit without spending unnecessary time performing numerous visual diagnostics from dozens of vantage points.

  Her bots were able to confirm her suspicions in a matter of a few minutes. The entire reactor system had scrammed when the boat had encountered the first of three altitude losses. When it became clear there was no way Copernicus One would avoid a hard landing, the fusion chamber and conduit assembly physically disconnected itself from the rest of the ship. The emergency systems had then flooded both the main and auxiliary power chambers with a thick rubbery foam substance which served to absorb the shock of the crash.

  The substance was designed to absorb temperature and inertial changes for a period of roughly 30 minutes at which point it self-dissolved into inert gas and little spherical nodules which were easily vacuumed up and recycled.

  The current challenge was rather simple. A scrammed reactor had to be physically reconnected to the boat’s power transfers. This was to prevent a potentially confused automatic system from undoing all the safety measures by reconnecting a fusion pile to a vessel that c
ould be on fire, submerged in a dangerous substance, full of injured crew members, and so forth.

  At this point, the danger had passed, so Yili instructed her bots to reconnect the port relays and bring main power back on-line. She set a temperature and reaction ceiling of ten percent capacity and decided to let the plant run for an hour or so to make sure there were no internal problems with the reaction chamber or mass.

  She did take a moment to recognize how effective all the technology was at mitigating the effects of a crash landing. Here she was munching on a sandwich and enjoying her dry-ice-chilled water while she monitored the mass temperature and coolant flow from the fusion reactor in the next chamber. She had already checked the Angel’s status and was rather surprised to learn she had more than 200 hours of life support capacity left even if she allowed the unit to just use its own stored battery energy. If the Angel hooked into ship’s power, she could potentially survive for more than a month.

  There were a few minutes of confusion when a small fire broke out along the port side coolant junction. Some of the insulation around the pressure release valve caught the sparks thrown off by one of the plasma torches and a fire started to climb the reaction chamber’s outer wall. The trundlebots pounced on the fire at once, but the first on the scene was just a little bit too hasty and ended up grabbing one of the burning insulation strips. It turned and rolled away from the fire to separate the insulation it was carrying from the damage.

  This drew the attention of the other two bots because the first was dragging a flaming piece of insulation around the chamber. A merry chase ensued as trundlebots two and three tried to corner trundlebot one and spray it with fire suppressant. Meanwhile, bot one was trying to keep its distance from the other two so they wouldn’t be in danger from the fire. Yili tried everything she could think of to reset the machines, but finally gave up and let the scene play itself out. By the time it was all over, all three of the bots and most of the reaction chamber was literally dripping with fire suppressant. Nevertheless, they did finally manage to repair the power relay, which meant they got points for completeness, but not so many for style.