The Jovian Sweep (Asteroid Scrabble Book 1)

by Martin Bourne

  “Positive identification!” yelled Sensors, his voice cracking slightly. “Trig configuration – probably ‘Trefoil’ class attack drones! Definite hostile drones, now three confirmed, closing from astern!”

  The querying green icons had turned a harsh definite red. As MacMorris watched, several new green ones glowed into existence behind them.

  “Now ten drones to stern,” intoned Sensors. “Three…correction…four confirmed as hostile, coming to one thirteen ninety.”

  MacMorris leaned over and punched an intercom. “All drones - immediate launch!” Somehow his gaze found Kavinsky and they shared an eternal instant of knowing. They were both long serving officers. They knew the score. Trig attack drones, this close in – it wasn’t just a bad situation. But they had to try. They had at least to go through the motions.

  MacMorris turned to the officer on the piloting console. “Helm? Bring us rimwards 40 points, sharply now!”

  “Yes…aye, aye sir!”

  “Propulsion? Stand by to connect main engines and begin to plot a course.”

  “Plot a course?” said the Ensign at the Propulsion console. “Where to sir?”

  “Anywhere. Just do it fast.”

  “Umm…aye, aye sir.”

  “Comms? Signal Griffin we are under attack!” MacMorris leaned forward and punched the console in frustration, then turned to Kavinsky. “Where are our drones?”

  Kavinsky's voice was totally calm. “The crews are assembled, beginning undocking from the launch bays now sir.”

  Too slow! They were not going to get out in time, in spite of all the drilling and training. “Come on,” he whispered under his breath. “Get out. Get out!”

  “Torpedo launched!”

  Everyone turned to the holodisplay. One of the pulsing icons had smeared into an ugly streak of scarlet. The hateful red line was reaching rapidly towards the blue icon that represented Dragon.

  “Evasive action!” yelled MacMorris. “Deploy decoys!”

  “Multiple torpedo launches.” The Sensor officer’s voice cracked slightly. “Now confirm at least nine hostile drones. Three appear to be moving towards Griffin.”

  MacMorris felt his heart pounding. Dragon was swinging wildly, her link warriors were rushing to defend her, jammers were trying to confuse their robot brains, decoys trying to entice them with seductive signals. It was all too little and too late. The incoming torpedoes were too close and too fast. The vindictive red streaks were almost coincidental with Dragon on the tactical display. All that was left them was desperation.

  “Brace! Brace! Brace!” he yelled into the ship’s address system. All over Dragon the experienced and the smart gripped at walls, or wedged themselves between hunks of machinery. The inexperienced, or those whose training had been driven out of their heads by emotional shock, stood stupid and vulnerable.

  The red line from the hostile drone icon reached Dragon and winked out.

  A fraction of a second later the blast of the proximity nuclear warhead, transferred by the gas debris cloud that had been the torpedo casing, slammed into Dragon’s starboard side. The whole ship bucked. The unwary were knocked clean off their feet. Even the braced were shook from side to side. Bulkheads strained. Simultaneously a massive electromagnetic pulse, working in concert with hard radiation, coursed through the ship. Circuits overloaded and shorted. Every display on the Bridge fogged into electronic confusion. Two seconds later about half of them flicked back into normality. The rest were dark, or displayed jagged static.

  MacMorris steadied himself. He registered pain from several points around and his body, and there was a metallic taste in his mouth, but nothing seemed broken. He looked around. Everyone looked much the same as he felt. They were slowly getting on their feet and manning their stations. The holotank now showed a positive horde of red icons and torpedo tracks.

  “Twenty-four -correction - twenty-five hostile drones to our starboard quarter now,” said Sensors.

  “One torpedo detonated. One more successfully decoyed,” added Kavinsky.

  MacMorris wiped his hand across his lips. The palm came away smeared with blood. He didn’t recall banging his mouth on anything. Maybe he had cut himself on his own teeth. He turned sharply to face the Comms officer, and his head swam. “Did you get through to Griffin?” he managed.

  The Comms officer gave up tapping hard at his console. “The Comms arrays have been fused solid sir. We can’t transmit at all.”

  Kavinsky was still cool and collected. “Several minor hull penetrations. Bulkhead 3A has burst, everything else is holding. Half the launch tubes in the starboard flight deck were warped by the blast. Every drone in the bay had its command circuits fried solid. Several casualties amongst the link warriors.”

  Half of their feeble war drone complement out of action already! The officer on Propulsion added to the woe.

  “Engines took a beating from the shock sir. The central nacelle has warped. Everything else seems ok at the moment.”

  “Now estimated thirty-eight hostile war drones within four spatials,” said Sensors. “The first wave seems to be retiring. Three more waves approaching. Torpedoes launched! Six plus torpedoes approaching from starboard!”

  “Hard over!” yelled MacMorris. “Max acceleration! Propulsion? Give me all you’ve got!” He turned to Kavinsky. “What’s the sitrep on the port bay drones?”

  “All remaining drones are away. They are taking up stations around us.”

  He glanced at the main holotank. Sure enough a corona of tiny azure icons had formed up around the large blue icon that was Dragon. A swarm of angry red icons clustered close by. Several more red streaks were arrowing out from them towards the Depot Ship. As MacMorris watched, one group reached Dragon and winked out.

  This time the ship gave a whole series of lurches, none as powerful as the first, but sharp enough.

  “Three more detonations,” reported Kavinsky. “Not as close that time.”

  “More shock and radiation damage,” said Propulsion. “Main engines are off-line. Attempting to restart.”

  MacMorris stared hard at the tactical holodisplay. “Come round to sixty-three zero eighty-eight,” he said. “And get the main engines online!”

  “Our drones are engaging the enemy,” reported Kavinsky. “Hostile drones are returning fire.”

  “Forty-two confirmed hostile drones,” said Sensors. “A group of twelve more at one forty ninety.”

  “Forty-two?” whispered MacMorris. The sickening sensation was beginning to work its way up from his stomach to his gorge. This was hopeless. Dragon was an escort Depot Ship. She did not carry enough drones to fend off an attack of this size. As he pondered, another hefty series of jolts broke his reverie. Dragon shook and writhed. More of the Bridge displays fogged. The tactical holotank blinked off, stuttered back on for a few seconds, and then went definitively dark.

  “Multiple detonations,” reported Kavinsky. “Forward two compartments are open to space. Main power plant shielding is damaged.”

  “Scans indicate Griffin has been damaged too, but she still seems able to manoeuvre,” said Sensors.

  “Can’t we tell?”

  “Sorry sir, we’ve lost all communications now,” said Comms. “We can’t even receive.”

  “Two enemy drones disabled,” said Kavinsky. “Five of ours are either destroyed or crippled.”

  “First two waves of enemy drones are withdrawing. Two more waves are approaching,” said Sensors.

  “Are the main engines back on line yet?” asked MacMorris.

  “That last nuke knocked the port engine out, and power fluctuations are badly affecting the others,” said Propulsion. “It’s going to take some time to repair and reset them.”

  “Torpedoes launched,” announced Sensors.

  MacMorris looked at Kavinsky. In all the years they had worked together, he had never known her be anything other than clipped and professional. In that instant he saw a crack of emotion, and was that a glistening ab
out her eye? She gave one brief, barely recognisable nod.

  MacMorris took a deep breath. After thirty years on spaceships, the last fifteen in the navy, it had finally come down to this. He made his voice curt. “Cut power.”

  The Propulsion officer stared. “Sir?”

  MacMorris somehow managed to raise his voice. “Cut all power. And open the air locks.”

  Another detonation, this one barely noticed, and not because it wasn’t all that close. Opening the airlocks - the universal signal for surrender! Could it be? But a glance at the tortured controls and rash of hurt red on the consoles made it clear to even the most determined there wasn’t much choice.

  “Aye, aye sir,” said Propulsion simply, and turned to his console.

  And just like that, it was over. His command was over. His career was over. There was just one duty left. He had to get his people out. The Trigs would detect the power drop and the change of the ship’s configuration caused by the airlocks opening. With a bit of luck they would realise what was happening and stop firing torpedoes. Of course, there might be half a dozen heading their way already. They would have to take their chances with that.

  MacMorris activated a circuit on his command chair. “Medical centre? Give me a casualty report.”

  “We’ve got thirty-seven cases down here Captain,” said a tinny medical voice, “Mostly abrasions and contusions, and a couple with broken bones. No fatalities that we know of, but we do have a couple of people unaccounted for.”

  “Unaccounted for?”

  There was another wrenching motion as another torpedo exploded close by. The circuit faded, and then mercifully reconnected.

  “Repeat that doctor.”

  “They may have been sucked out when one of the bulkheads blew. Explosive decompression.”

  There was bile as well as blood in MacMorris’ mouth now.

  “Can your patients be moved easily?”

  “Some might need help, but I think we can handle that.”

  “Then get them all to the lifeboats Doctor. If you need more hands to help, just grab anyone you can.”

  He cut the connection before the Doctor could comment. He didn’t want to hear any more. He turned round and surveyed the shattered Bridge. Most of the vidscreens and consoles were now dark. A few displayed only static. Some were covered in red flickering lights. For the first time he noticed an ominous layer of blue-grey smoke hovering at just above head height. Most of the deck officers were looking at him, strain and shock etched on their faces. They were trying to draw strength from their captain, strength that he doubted he had anymore. He could hardly blame them. Everything had happened so quickly. Five minutes ago everything had been normal. He had even been mentally chiding himself for not getting into the action more.

  His ship, the vessel he was responsible for, was dying, and there wasn’t a thing that he could do about it. All that was left was to administer the coup de grace. He took a deep breath to steady himself. “Alright everybody. Make sure your consoles are scrambled. Then get to your lifeboats, and good luck to you all.” Everyone promptly stood up and headed for the exits in an orderly manner. Strange how stress took people. At the last practice evacuation there had been a confused rush.

  MacMorris worked his way unevenly to the ship’s address system. Hopefully it was still working. Flipping it on, he yelled out the one order he had hoped he would never have to make.

  “Abandon ship, I say again, abandon ship! All hands, abandon ship.”

  The main lights went off, to be immediately replaced by the duller glow of the emergency lamps. Fluorescent arrows, glowing even through the rising fug of smouldering circuitry, pointed on floors and walls and ceilings. MacMorris made his way unsteadily over to the Sensors station.

  “Any more torpedoes launched?”

  “Can’t see any sir,” said the man, “but the sensor arrays have been heavily damaged. It’s possible that…well…” His voice broke.

  “Alright, Ensign. Take it easy. The Trigs usually honour the rules of war. We'll just have to hope there are no more heading our way. Scramble your console, set the self destruct and then get to your lifeboat.”

  “Aye, aye sir.”

  MacMorris stood up and took a long look around. Most of the lights were out. Every monitor was fogged. An ominous fug of blue smoke was hovering just below the ceiling. It was an impossible sight, familiar and yet very different. He jerked when the Sensor operator spoke again.

  “Ready sir.”

  He took a deep breath. “Activate the self-destruct. Ten minute delay.”

  The man leaned down and pulled at an old-fashioned manual lever at the base of the console. An electronic switch would be too risky. After all, if there was no power it might not work.

  “Go.”

  The two of them left, walking steadily but not running, and headed to the dorms. An officer at the door ushered them in, incongruously saluting him as he entered. The beds had been lifted up, revealing acceleration seats. MacMorris strapped himself in with quick practiced movements. He was next to an external viewport. He could see part of the external hull, and bits of debris floating like dust motes around it.

  “Everyone in?” said the officer.

  There was a chorus of affirmatives. He spoke last. The lifeboat engine kicked in. Gravitational control disappeared. His body strained against the sudden G force, a sudden, hard jolt digging the straps into his torso. The view outside spiralled for a few seconds, then it smeared. He was sure he caught a glimpse of Dragon. There was an instant of a physical retch, more at leaving for the last time than disorientation. Someone across from him was instantly sick. MacMorris was too ill to do the same.

  Chapter 26.

  Fleet Flagship Valiant, 100 spatials spinwards of Ganymede.

  Courage came onto the bridge at an unseemly trot, his jacket still somewhat awry. Captain Raime and his aides were waiting for him at the raised platform overlooking the large tactical holotank. Raime had a hooded look about his eyes. Cromarty’s and Prince’s expressions were carefully blank. Courage ignored them all and leapt up the raised platform two steps at a time.

  “Where did this happen?” he asked.

  “About here sir,” said Prince, pointing in the holotank.

  He took one look. “There? As close as that?”

  Courage knew immediately it was a mistake to blurt that out. He breathed deeply to steady himself, but he noticed straightaway that it was too late. Most of his subordinates had already noted his surprise. Even Cromarty’s eyes widened a fraction, although the rest of her expression remained professionally neutral. So much for the aura of all-knowing invincibility she had advised him to maintain. Well, there was no time to worry about that now. He had always had doubts about its morale value anyway.

  And he certainly had doubts as to its moral value.

  His eyes raced over the display in the tactical holotank while he tried to gather his dignity. His outburst had been a mistake, but it was an understandable one. This was shocking news. The Trigs were that far into the system already? He slowed down to button up his cuffs, using the mundane task to compose himself. A hostile contact in that position meant that the Trigs were closing in. Fast. They were much on than even the most ambitious of his projections. They had barely deviated from their originally reported course and velocity, even though they must have known they had been spotted. That showed vast confidence, or colossal arrogance. Were they being stupid, or just very clever? Whichever it was, he had been caught.

  Or more particularly, two of his ships had.

  “How comeGriffin and Dragon are only as far on as that? They should be much closer to us!”

  “We’re not sure sir,” replied Prince. “We hadn’t heard from them in some time, so our plots were based on approximates and estimates. It was a bit of a shock when we were able to get a fix from Griffin’stransmission.” Courage gave him a sharp look. “We’ve been limiting communications as much as possible to avoid detection sir,” explai
ned Prince defensively, “and Jupiter’s electrical storms have been particularly active recently. It's causing communications difficulties in some areas, and unfortunately the onesGriffin and Dragon were transiting were particularly affected.”

  All of which meant there had been an almighty foul up somewhere. He had needed those two to get back to the main body of the fleet as quickly as possible. If they didn’t, the encroaching Trig battlegroup would have interposed itself between them and the rest of the fast division and driven Griffin and Dragon counter-spinwards and out of the action completely. Their fighting capabilities were limited, but in this fight he needed everything he could get, particularly as a good proportion of the drones they did carry were valuable scouts. Having said that, it didn’t look like their vaunted reconnaissance assets had helped them very much.

  Even given the speed of the Trig movements the two should still have been safe. It had been a pretty safe gamble ordering them to re-join the rest of the fleet. Even with the course deviation he had instructed them to take they were fast enough to have gotten well out of the way. The dog leg course might have slowed their progress, but it also carried them further away from the Trigs approach course. The problem was that the Trigs had cracked on much faster than even the most extreme estimate and the two escorts hadn’t made as good time as they should have. Something somewhere had gone wrong. If only he had more long-range reconnaissance drones! If he had been able to keep a better track of Trig movements, this might not have happened.

  There was going to be a tremendous row over this, one that would detract from his command. Instead of concentrating on beating the Trigs all too many of his people would be questioning what had happened, or trying to justify their conduct and dodge the blame. Either way they would not be focussing on what was important.