Yorktown: Katana Krieger #1

by Bill Robinson

  "Orientation within limits." It's McAdams, followed by Shelby.

  "Reinitialization of auto pilot coordination in 60 seconds." On board the four ships, the autopilots are linking to create and maintain proper formation under acceleration.

  Summerlin hits the thrusters and moves Congress (and us) a safer distance from my frigate. He stabilizes the joined pair less than 10 seconds before engines fire, pushing us at four gees toward the jump points. This time it's a half hour crushed into the seat of the gig, a bag full of explosives being held in place by my knees, the sun growing dangerously large ahead.

  We hear the jump countdowns in our ears as the frigate and corvettes ready themselves. Yorktown separates its autopilot from the link at the 15 minute mark, rigs itself for silent running, and activates its jump engines. We don't have to watch in our screens, the clear canopy of the gig fills with the sight as my ship goes from a shiny sleek cylinder to a dull black ball of energy, then simply disappears.

  Yeager and I prep our ship, set to detach the second the jump field goes down. Assuming, of course, that the jump puts us where it's supposed to, which is 30 meters behind the big white ship waiting at Gamma Theta 1. The joy of jumping is that the energy of the ship, kinetic from its motion and electric from its reactors, can be transferred into velocity and direction after the jump according to the laws of conservation of momentum. We know from the data Santa Cruz sent us the expected position and velocity vector of the enemy at this exact instant, provided they haven't changed anything in the last 25 or so hours.

  Summerlin checks in. "Foxtrot Alpha this is Congress. Report status." We're jumping either way now, less than three minutes until we reach the point, no other choice except fly into the sun.

  "Foxtrot Alpha is go. Tally Ho, Lieutenant."

  "Aye, sir, jump in 46 seconds." From then on we hear Summerlin and his crew go through their checklists, we watch the world go black around us, and we hear the magic word.

  Chapter 13

  And just like that we are hanging upside down considerably less than 30 meters behind a very large ship, and roughly even with its engine bells. I hit the button that frees us from Congress, watch as the three corvettes hit their drives and skate along the surface of the enemy, taunting him to follow them. The three spheres are quickly out of visual, but I am following them on infrared.

  Yeager taps our thrusters, holds us behind and below, but accelerating slightly faster, closing in on the target. Both of us praying that they won't chase the corvettes or that the ablative coating will keep the raw engine exhaust from eating away our ship if they do.

  Summerlin and his battle group are far too fast for the big cargo ship to follow, our plan dependent on them holding station while tracking the corvettes and looking for Yorktown. We have 90 minutes, then Santa Cruz will appear on their screens pretending to be Yorktown, who will be stalking them from behind. If they don't surrender, we either have exited the enemy by then, or live with the consequences when Shelby shoves 60 megatons up their tailpipes.

  Less than a minute after the jump, we thrust up holding maybe a meter above the surface of the ship, thankfully no raging fires. We need zero gee to get out of the gig and inside the target. I punch the switch to lower our gear and prepare to activate the electromagnets. Yeager gently puts us down, green and blue lights confirming the seal.

  Still no need to talk, we do what we've practiced over and over again in the sim, shutting down the ship systems, doing our best to make sure it will start up when we need to leave.

  Yeager indicates his readiness to move by flipping up a switch cover and using a gloved hand to push a square black button underneath. The two part canopy rises up, and we both unbuckle ourselves. The ship is not under acceleration, we're fine so long as it stays that way.

  It's a quick float up and out, get my backpack out and grab Yeager's and hand it to him. He extracts the rifle and pistol pressing them into their attachment points on the suit with what would be a satisfying click if there was air. The grenades next, then the spare ammo and knife. I am a mirror with my gear.

  We do a quick check of each other, then I hand him the explosives and I put the pack with the explorer's gear on my back, minus a special toy. We push down to the surface of the ship, our boot magnets working to hold us in place. I touch a button on my forearm and watch as the canopy seals.

  When I look back at the Master Sergeant, he raises a fist head high, holds a second, then points. A quick push of another forearm button to tell the suit we want to walk, and we follow Yeager's course to what should be a hatch.

  The first potential flaw in my allegedly brilliant plan is the simple fact that the ship is coated with a compound full of titanium. If they didn't leave the hatch and its operations exposed, we'll be testing the explosives earlier than intended.

  The dull white surface of the ship is at least thin enough that our mag boots can find the steel underneath the coating. Virtually no reflection off the surface of the ship, either from the Gamma Theta star or planet number 1 below us, it's unnerving to be walking across something completely white that looks intermittently black. Yorktown needs a coat of this when we get home.

  The hatch is exactly where Yeager said (or non-verbally indicated but you know what I mean) it was. There's a five millimeter or so wide crack that extends to form a rectangle roughly a meter on a side. The ships cargo hatches vary in size from big enough to pour through to big enough to load containers through, to almost as big as the compartment is wide. We picked the closest small one. The writing on it tells us this is Defino.

  The access panel is on the bow side of the rectangle. I go down on one knee next to it, sure that I have this completely under control. The panel is six inches on a side, with a slight indent on one edge where the latch is. I slide my gloved finger into the space, or I try to slide it in. The latches on these things are simple push buttons, but the coating layer has partially closed the opening and my finger won't go.

  My first thought is to take my glove off, but given the vacuum and near zero Kelvin temperature I quickly put that one aside and go for my knife. Try about 10 different angles before I find the one that works, and the closest edge of the access panel separates from the hull. I use the knife blade to push it up, rewarding me with a set of push buttons, a green LED showing the compartment to be pressurized, and a couple red LED's defying me to change their color.

  I laugh at their insolence. The little box I brought with me is metallic, two inches wide, four inches long, and a quarter of an inch thick. It has one button, black, near one end, and its own LED lights, one off and one on, a dark Marine green. I put it face down over the access panel and push the magic button. You can't see the electrons move, or the radio waves waving, but it takes less than 10 seconds for the second light on the box to light, and the two defiant red lights to become shiny green.

  My magic box remains in place, it supposedly will make sure that the hatch never tells the command deck that it is open. Yeager has the hatch lever in his hand, pushes down, out and then up, the hatch opening easily to his touch.

  I go first, pushing down into the airlock which is completely black. The light on my helmet goes on automatically, and I reach out for the ladder extending down seemingly into endless darkness. Hand over hand for not many hands, the ladder ends 10 feet after it began at the bottom of the airlock, far from the bottom of what we know is a 98 foot diameter sphere.

  Another panel stares me in the face. One red and two green lights. Yeager closes the top hatch, the red becomes green and one green becomes red. I reach down, move a large handle 90 degrees to starboard and open it into the compartment. A quick push downward, a grab at the ladder, and reach back to close the hatch and move the exterior handle back 90 degrees to port.

  I float beside the ladder, press a small button on my helmet and am rewarded with a markedly brighter light that I play around the space as I move my head. The hold is half full of some kind of ore pressed against the stern wall by a previous
acceleration of the ship. There is a hatch at the base of the sphere, appears to be accessible, gee forces clearing the black rock away.

  The light goes back to normal as I release my hand, look at Yeager who has joined me and closed the hatch above. We're both holding onto the top of the ladder, I raise my fist head high and then point. He acknowledges with a finger gestures, I find the bottom rung of the ladder and push off toward the hatch.

  Zero gee, it's a quick trip down. My boots grab hold of the steel as I arrive and I wait for Yeager to join me. Use the time to active the sound system on the suit. It doesn't play music, it let's me hear outside as if I didn't have my suit on, and let's me talk through a small speaker if I feel the need.

  This hatch is purely mechanical, designed for either naked or gloved hands, a set of large LED's glowing green, probably an interlock to keep this hatch and the one at the top from opening simultaneously. It's a heavy steel rectangle with smoothed off corners and a roughly oval red circular wheel at the center connected to a set of spoked latches, I grab a hold as Yeager unhooks his rifle and positions himself to end anyone unlucky enough to be standing on the other side.

  Three spins, we watch the latches move back sufficiently, and I open the hatch outward into the ship. No one is there, at least within our eyeball range, and the sensors in our suits don't find anything either, but they are only scanning through the hatch opening. We both switch our feet to "walk", activating the very intelligent electromagnetic boots.

  I go first, Yeager covering, another set of hand signals preceding. My rifle comes off my suit and into my hand as soon as I'm clear. I do a visual and instrument sweep. Nothing. Gauges show breathable atmosphere here, but we're not staying and we're certainly not opening our suits.

  Yeager stays put, back to the wall, creating as wide an area of fire for himself as he can. I move the 40 feet toward the hull. There is a corridor of sorts between each compartment created by the natural curvature of the spheres, while the port and starboard edges of the compartments side up to the hull of the ship. On the port edge of each sphere there are deformities sufficient to create a passage way large enough for a person to float and reasonably sized cargo to move. There are lights in the port side companionway, but the area down each of the side corridors is total darkness.

  Once I get to the passage way I take up surveillance duty and Yeager floats down to meet me. We step to the hull, back to back, Yeager facing the stern and me the bow. All clear. I push hard past the next sphere and around the side to the hatch, nearly 100 feet in a very exposed position. Yeager covers me until I make the turn, then follows.

  The hatch into compartment 11 is identical to compartment 12 where we entered. I spin the handle, can't see the latches from this side, but I can feel them. Making sure Yeager has it covered, I pull the handle toward us.

  Pitch black inside, just like it's neighbor. I stick my head in, find the same rock as before jammed against the back wall by the ship's previous acceleration as before. Pull my head out, back against the wall, rifle up, then Yeager puts his head in. The bombs in his backpack are adjustable to a variety of scenarios, including attachment to a door latch. He arms the bomb and seals it magnetically to the door. We can set it off by remote if we need a distraction, otherwise the next thing to open that door will be less than happy that they did.

  Then it's back down the triangular corridor, but we stop 20 feet short. There's sound, definitely someone or some thing headed our way. We grab handholds on the walls and toss ourselves back into the darkness of the corridor, cut our lights, and wait. Four figures in space suits pass by, three in standard issue commercial suits and one in a suit unlike anything we've seen before.

  He (it?) is roughly the same height as the others, but seemingly heavier, the suit a dark red, metallic, flexible, no visible controls or tubes or tanks. The front visor on the helmet is black, so black it seems impossible to see through. Three fingers and a thumb on the glove, the fingers thicker than on ours, the thumb longer. None of the four turn their heads our way, which is possibly a good thing since they all appear to be carrying assault rifles identical to ours. We may be better shots, but four shooters are hard to evade when you're standing in a 10 foot wide hallway.

  Once they pass Yeager and I move as quickly and quietly down the dark corridor as we can, getting to the end just in time to see them enter container 12. We probably just lost the gig, our only way out. Don't know if the master sergeant saw the gloves, but I'm betting he did and I need to do some explaining there too.

  Quick hand signal to Yeager, and we make another jump toward the bow, then jog down the corridor to container 10. It turns out to be empty when we get there, though we left another of Yeager's surprises behind inside it.

  I head back toward the port side, Yeager covers and then follows. Look toward the stern, our friends appear to still be in the last container. They certainly have found the gig by now, and know we are here.

  Around the bend to the front of container nine, last of the containers designed to hold raw materials. We go through our routine again, find another empty container, leave another explosive present, and head back toward the port side.

  Container eight is the first with 60 foot access doors on the hull, designed for larger cargo than raw ores, though I suppose it could hold anything. And I'm right. My light plays around the inside, no ores visible on the floor or far wall, then as I move up, suspended in a webbing in the middle of the compartment is one of those little pointy ships.

  I stick my head back out of the compartment and motion for Yeager to join me. Once he's in and the hatch is sealed, I break vocal silence, quietly, radio transmitter still off.

  "Master Sergeant, see if you can find the hatch on that thing, I'll do the photography."

  "OhhRah, Captain." This is clearly nothing but fun for him.

  I take the high quality camera out of my backpack, shoot a few shots from distance, not worried about whether or not someone might see the flash, then close in on the thruster pods and take another set from every angle. Then I go looking for Yeager.

  He's floating beside an open hatch, looking at the biometric panel next to it. The hatch must have already been open, because no human hand would fit appropriately within the panel.

  "Yes, Sergeant," I say it as quietly but forcefully as I can, "they are not human." I can't tell behind his visor if he's having more fun or less now.

  I shoot photos of the access panel, then we float inside. There are only two seats up front, the rest of the space is dirty, covered in remnants of brown and black and red ores. I shoot a couple shots, then head to the flight deck. Two chairs there, both of which could be in any space craft in the Union fleet. There are no switches or knobs on the control panel, only buttons and sliders, all larger than what you would see on Yorktown. Makes sense given the finger sizes we saw on the glove.

  There are five large screens, appear to be LCDs, on the main panel, a pedestal between the seats full of buttons and levers, and an overhead panel of the large buttons and a few gauges. Little snowflakes written under and around the controls. Everything is off, and I'm going to leave it that way. I shoot photos of the entire ship and then stow the camera. There's no way we're flying this thing out of here.

  Yeager has taken a couple of the jars from my backpack and gathered samples of the various powders from the cargo area. Then he breaks his silence.

  "Captain, there are two sets of drawings back here you should photograph."

  I float back to where he's pointing. Next to the hatch there is a set of red snowflakes on a silver metal plate, either instructions to open, or a warning about it, or both. I shoot that. Then there's another plate near the stern, possibly with loading instructions given the diagrams that are with the snowflakes. My guess is it's ensuring that the center of gravity doesn't get out of bounds. Makes for another set of award winning shots regardless.

  "Let's be on the roll, Master Sergeant," I say that at normal voice, pretty sure I'm not being heard
by anything with big fingers. "Please leave one of your presents on board."

  If I could see his face, I'm sure it would have a smile.

  We float out into the container after he's done, then use the webbing as a base to push downwards and back toward the hatch. No way for us to know if anyone's waiting, Yeager takes a crouched position directly in line with the opening, rifle at his shoulder, as I rotate the handle and push the door open. Luck is still with us.

  I move through, assume a defensive position as Yeager exits after affixing another bomb to the hatch cover. He's got four left.

  We're quickly to the port side of the ship, our covering efforts wasted as the companionway is still clear. Perhaps our friends are still outside with the gig. We shoot down toward the next right turn, make it easily and find the hatch into cargo compartment seven. Despite my expectations of something amazing, it is completely empty.

  Back to the corridor, no bomb on the hatch this time, back to the port side, check that it's still clear, then rocket down toward the bow, flipping right and stopping at the hatch for compartment six. I spin the lock, open the hatch, and discover a set of containers within the container, strapped in a webbing designed to maximize space for square boxes in a round compartment.