Dreaming of Atmosphere

by Jim C. Wilson

  Tac alerted us to the weapons release, and the time to intercept had by then been increased to around seventy seven minutes. Zoe was still in the pilot’s seat, and despite her nerves the manoeuvre was well within her capabilities to perform. We merely applied lateral thrust and shunted the ship to port by a few kilometres. No point letting the round get too close, we figured, in case they decided to use proximity fuses in the giant bullets.

  There really wasn’t much we could do, besides wait and watch the shell close on us. Fel and Tac ran a few calculations and determined that this was probably the furthest we’ll get from the Blade of Xerxes, as our speeds were nearly identical. From now on, the time to intercept would begin to shrink. We waited with baited breath as the countdown to the shell passing us counted down.

  “Round Alpha approaching intercept point in ten seconds.” called Fel’negr.

  “Should I move us further away?” asked Zoe, nervous as a mouse.

  “Negative, maintain our course. Are shields active?” I said.

  Shields are at maximum potential, Acting Captain Donovan.

  “Intercept point reached!” came Fel.

  We watched our sensors as the shell passed our position and then vanished from our view.

  “Detonation detected. Reading high concentrations of gamma rays. Neutrons and alpha particles lagging by a few micro-seconds. Looks like a timed fuse nuclear warhead. All external sensors are offline.”

  Shields are absorbing the EM effects of the gamma rays, with minimal impact to our systems. The external sensors should recalibrate in a few minutes.

  “They used nuclear warheads on us?” asked Zoe.

  “They probably figured we’d move, but if we didn’t think to pop our shields up the EM pulse could cause our systems to overload and drop out. Tac, what’s the effectiveness of our shields against more of those blasts?”

  There was almost no disruption to the Prallgian-Kronnen field, Acting Captain.

  “They probably won’t try that again then.” I guessed

  “What else can they throw at us?” asked Zoe.

  The Massilov Stone Burner rail gun is capable of firing up to twelve separate warhead designs. You have witnessed the nuclear variant and the standard kinetic rounds. Shall I list the other possible rounds?

  “Perhaps just send it to our overlays. We’ll need to work out how to deal with each as they come up. Is there any way to determine which type of round is coming our way?”

  Aside from two of the models, no.

  “Which two?”

  The laser guided ion shell, and the thermal shell.

  “Show me the information on those two.”

  My overlay began to show two files, the first was a spec sheet detailing the Mark 98 Laser Guided Ionising Magnetic Round. The Mark 98 was fired by projecting a laser beam at the target that ionised the path to the round would follow. When the round was fired a magnetic field was maintained around the shell, similar to how a hard light bullet is formed. The metal slug was then directed by the ionised path to the target. It basically made it a homing bullet.

  The second file showed the details of a T898 Thermal Lancer shell. The round was launched at the target, and during transit a fusion reaction took place that superheated the dense round and encapsulated it in another energy field. The heat from the shell was so great that it was designed to cause weakening of the hull, overloading sensors and generally making life unbearably hot on the target. That’s just if it gets a near miss. The heat from the round has been compared to the coronal discharge of some stars, contained to a small area by the energy field. When the energy field collapses the heat dissipates quickly, but can still cause a lot of damage to nearby vessels.

  “The other ten are undetectable?”

  Correct, although there may be ways to interfere with the incoming shells to get a better idea about what we may be facing each time.

  “Active sensors?”

  Nanites left in our wake may be able to transmit data to the ship, if they intercept the shell within a certain distance of the ship.

  “That won’t give us too much time to react.”

  “It’ll be better than nothing.” admitted Fel.

  “True. We should work out how we’re going to beat each round, when the nanite cloud gets hit and we find out what it is we might be able to implement our plan before it hits us.”

  “Can’t we just keep moving out of the way?” asked Zoe.

  “We will, only we can’t shift our direction too often or by too much. Each time we do we shave small amounts of acceleration off our speed. We do that too often and too much, and the Xerxes gets close enough to just saturate the area with rounds.”

  “Why can’t we use the beamer on the shells?”

  “It took heavy damage in our last fight. We just haven’t had the time to get up there and do repairs. Other repairs took priority, space-worthiness comes before weapons.”

  “Why are they trying to destroy us? Won’t that destroy the package too?”

  “Possibly. They might figure that if they can’t have it, then we shouldn’t benefit from it either.”

  “There’s another possibility,” said Fel, “They may try to destroy it so that rival Corporations don’t obtain it and reverse engineer the technology.”

  Fel’negr’s estimate is the most likely outcome that Koveli-Xue Corportation wishes to pursue.

  “Okay, who’s our best expert in the types of exotic effects we’re likely to encounter?”

  “Unfortunately, the late Mr Thackeray was well versed in exotic particles and energy types.”

  “Damn it.”

  “What about Crege or Max? Cuts?”

  “Mal is only proficient in our propulsion systems, and material repairs. Crege may offer some insight, the Garz’a may have had some input into some of these weapons’ designs. Maxine may also be of some help, if she can be interrupted.”

  “We’ll see. I promised we’d handle this next day without her so let’s try and do that.”

  I should be able to fill in for the loss of Chief Engineer Thackeray.

  “Good. Let’s get everyone in the mess deck and go through them.”

  “What about me?” asked Zoe.

  “Tac, can you please display the current time to intercept of any rounds on the pilot’s console display? Keep it updated in real time. Zoe, as the Xerxes starts to gain on us that number should begin to reduce, but we should have several days before they catch us. If there’s another round fired, Tac will alert us all and we should have enough time to get back up here and deal with it. Are you okay to keep watch up here by yourself until then?”

  “I guess. I promise not to touch anything.”

  “All right. Stay alert.” I kissed her on the head and called all the crew to the mess deck on the PA system. I then left the command module with Fel.

  When we arrived, Artemis and Hergo we already at a table. We waited until the others arrived and then I shared the files on the different warhead types the Xerxes’ gun could fire.

  “I’m sending you information on the various types of weapons that will be coming our way over the next few days. We’re looking for ways to counter, evade or remove the threats these weapons pose to our ship. Any information about the effects these weapons will have on us, ways we can avoid that fate, or suggestions to stay alive and I want to hear about it. This is a brainstorming session, so any thought you have may be valuable. I’ll bring up the first few on the holo-projector. Tac, if you may?”

  The warhead design specs of the nuclear round that was just used on us appeared in three dimensions over the forward bulkhead and tables.

  “This warhead was just deployed over an hour ago, and was detonated using a timed fuse. That meant they calculated how long it would take for the round to reach us, given our velocity and acceleration, and timed it to go off at the right time. We were far enough away that the blast didn’t affect us, and our shields were able to stop the EM field. We’ve figured we should be ab
le to withstand these effects indefinitely, as long as we maintain our shields.”

  Another round appeared, with very little information displayed beyond mass and density.

  “This is a standard kinetic round. No warhead. They destroy their targets by simply transferring their vast kinetic energy on to the target. We just need to stay away from them as they pass.”

  “Won’t they cause hazards for traffic down range?” asked Denno.

  “Not really.” said Artemis, “After a time the Protectorate facility at the Jump Station should pick it up on long range scanners and flag it as part of the MTAS broadcasts. If it does become a hazard, they’ll just dispatch a corvette to go and destroy it before it reaches the target.”

  “Artemis is correct, although firing a large amount of these weapons could cause an issue. For this reason we don’t believe they’ll use kinetic rounds unless they have a high degree of success of hitting us.”

  The spec sheet for the Mark 98 round appeared.

  “We’ll have lots of warning before this round strikes us. It’s guided by an ionised stream of electrons riding a laser beam to us, and can carry nuclear tips, kinetic tips or standard explosive yields. A bit harder to avoid. Anyone have any ideas for countering this?”

  “Mirrors?” offered Artemis.

  Fel raised his hand and I nodded for him to speak. “The laser isn’t the guiding factor, it’s the ion stream that it holds. The beam will still strike us, regardless if we reflect it off in another direction.”

  “What if we directed it back on the warhead?”

  “Tac?”

  The director beam uses pulse coded modulation to counter interference.

  “Tac,” said Fel, “will the algorithm we worked on last week be able to decode the pulse code on the beam?”

  You are correct.

  “I can have a sensor installed on a mirror to analyse that beam, send it to Tac for decoding and then feed it into a nanite package to alter the mirror’s surface to mimic the pulse code.”

  I am uncertain that I will be able to decode the pulse code in time if they use this attack at close range.

  “It’s a start, at least. That’s one down. Next,” I showed the thermal round, “This little hot potato.”

  “Are those specs accurate? They get that hot?” asked Artemis.

  “They’re accurate, or at least we can’t afford to assume they’re not.” I said.

  “Can we disrupt the magnetic field that holds it together?” asked Hergo.

  “How?” I asked. There was a few moments of silence.

  “Metal.” said Mal.

  “Metal?”

  “Lots of metal, with an induced current. Should create big holes in the electro-magnetic effect and it should pop the bubble.”

  “I believe we can rig up some repair materials and deck plates with batteries and some basic electronics to achieve that effect.” said Fel.

  “We just litter our path with them when we see it?” I asked.

  “That might work, actually. We’d be limited in how many times we can do it, of course.”

  There is a large uncertainty factor involved in this counter, I must warn you. Offered Tac.

  “So we’d need a fall back plan, a plan B.”

  “Cryo nanites?” offered Denno, “We still have several containers worth.”

  Applying both measures significantly reduces their uncertainty factor.

  “Good. All right, progress.” Next I showed a warhead that was simply called an X-2. “This nasty piece of work creates instabilities in space-time. Something to do with gravity, similar to a Thudgun. It gets too close and it will shake the ship to pieces. It will also be attracted to anything that’s heavier than it. Like a space ship.”

  “What’s the range of its effect?” asked Denno.

  “It can detect mass at just over five kilometres. We could program an evasion pattern into the console that swings us wide whenever this is detected. I don’t want us taking five click detours every time a round comes our way.”

  “How would we know it was this round?” asked Artemis.

  “We plan to trail a nanite net behind us, just within range of our sensors to pick up. I think we’ll have about ten seconds to get clear. Should be enough time if we program the dodge as an automatic response.”

  “Works for me.” she said.

  “This next one is called a Xendrite Bomb. It detonates a field of energy that affects living tissue. It can directly shut down the electrical impulses in the brains of most sentient races. They’re outlawed in many Networks, but not the Votus-Eridani, for some reason.”

  “Will our shields be able to block the energy field?” asked Fel.

  Unlikely. Our hull may be able to absorb some of the effect, but there is a strong chance there may be enough penetration to affect the crew.

  “So what does stop the field?” asked Mal.

  Cellulose has been found to be an effective barrier against Xendrite waves.

  “Cellulose? Plant fibre?”

  “Polycrete foam uses a polysaccharide similar to cellulose.” came Zoe over the PA. She was obviously listening in.

  “Nice. We coat the ship in polycrete.” said Mal sarcastically.

  That will not be necessary. A lattice mesh will suffice, much like a faraday cage for electricity.

  “Good work, Zoe. We shouldn’t need to detect that one, we just do the lattice and leave it.” I said, smiling at a camera. “This next one has me stumped. Never even heard of these effects.”

  I brought up the specs of a warhead called a Yand-Gur Type G. Most of the specs were indecipherable to me.

  The Type G uses farnian pressures to slow time in a local field. The effect of decelerating time as it passed close to an object breaks most molecular bonds.

  “What are farnian pressures?” I asked.

  A principle developed by the Votus nearly two millennia ago. They haven’t been able to find a use for the technology beyond weaponising it.

  “So how do we counter it?” I asked.

  Insufficient data to provide a meaningful answer.

  “I’m with plastic brains.” said Mal. The others just gave me blank stares.

  “Will the nanites be able to detect the change in time flow?” asked Fel.

  Negative. If they enter the time distortion effect, they will be destroyed.

  “So we’ll see holes in our nanite net?” I asked

  Correct.

  “Okay, at least we’ll be able to detect it. What the range of the effect?”

  Adjustable from 220m to 4 km.

  “If we keep our net tighter than two-twenty metres,” said Crege, “and we start to see holes, we move. We map the size of the effect and program an evasive pattern to counter it.”

  “That works for me.” I said.

  We went on like this for another hour, going through each weapon type and brainstorming ideas to counter them. It felt good, working together like this. We were acting like a team, and seemed to have put the recent tragedy of Eric’s death behind us, for the meantime. Even Mal was being occasionally helpful. When we had our defence plan hashed together, we organised work teams to start implementing them and preparations were soon underway.

  We just hoped it would be enough. There were a lot of assumptions and guesses, but we had no blaring gaps in our logic or reasoning according to Tac. We also covered all the weapon types, which surprised me. Had Jenner been right when he chose us for this mission? Were we just the right mix of balls and brains to pull off a stunt like raiding the Gossamer System? If we could outsmart and out manoeuvre a Corporate warship captain, we just might be.

  If we couldn’t, it would be a moot point. We’d all be dead before we got there.

  36.

  We’d just started to implement our plans, when Tac alerted us to another firing. As Fel and I ran to the command module, the Blade of Xerxes fired again. And again. The fourth round was fired just as we got to the hatch to the bridge. Zoe was almost in a pa
nic.

  “What do I do? What if they’re all nukes? We’re not ready for other types! How will we tell what they are?” she was practically jumping on the seat.

  “Our wisest course of action is to remain calm, Ms. Ward.” chided Fel as he closed up on his station.

  “And I wouldn’t let Crege catch you jump on his chair. He’ll be cranky.” I added.

  “How can you be so calm!? They fired four shells! We’re not even ready for one!”

  “Hergo and Denno are deploying the nanite net as we speak, that’ll give us some idea about what we’re facing.” I said.

  “But we’re not ready for anything!”

  “She has a point, Seth. Do you have a plan?”

  “I’m working on it. My console says we have seventy three minutes until convergence. How much lead time will that nanite net give us, Tac?”

  Not much, Acting Captain Donovan. The best we could hope for is 12.2 to 14.1 seconds.

  In the end, we’d decided to use a trailing nanite arrangement. We had several canisters of scan nanites that Tac was able to reprogram to form chains. These nano-scopic tendrils will dangle behind the ship like streamers, branching and dividing to form our net. It was the best way to get the maximum distance and still communicate with them. They’d also be able to keep up as they were anchored to our hull. As long as we didn’t perform high gee manoeuvres they were strong enough to remain attached during the lateral thrusts to avoid incoming rounds.

  “Okay.” I started, “Options; we sacrifice some acceleration and veer wide of the whole cluster. We get a minimum of five clicks from the nearest one, hope it’s not one of the more exotic ones. Seems like a big gambit to start the show off with, and this seems like it was designed to cause us to shave some time off our head start.”

  “It’s a plausible scenario.” agreed Fel.