by Britt Ringel
Damn, that should have been the first thing I ordered, he chastised himself. Stay in the game, Heskan!
“Thanks, Mike,” Heskan acknowledged. “See what you can do and report back to me.”
Lieutenant Riedel moved toward the bridge door but stopped at his station to collect equipment. To his left, Heskan could hear Chief Brown telling the next two closest damage control teams to leave their stations and meet with the first officer at the bow.
“We’ve intercepted the wreckage of the sloop, Captain. Do I hold our course or come to rest?” Selvaggio asked.
Damn, another thing I’m not controlling. Everything feels like it’s happening too fast and I’m falling further behind. Irritated, Heskan looked at the tactical plot before speaking. “Come about and stop us two light-seconds from the edge of the Beta Field. Make your speed point oh-eight, Ensign.”
Heskan looked back to Riedel and watched him as he sped toward the exit. He was returning his attention to the main screen when his eyes passed over the weapons section. He studied Vernay, who was busy bringing mass driver system control directly to her console. My God, she looks terrible; I’ve never seen that much stress on a person’s face before. A shocking realization came over him. Do I look like that? Looking toward the front of the bridge again, he could only see the backs of Ensigns Selvaggio’s and Truesworth’s shocksuit helmets. Heskan almost turned to see how Chief Brown was holding up but realized he had once again drifted away from his duties.
“Sensors,” Heskan said in as calm a voice as he could manage, “skip the damage assessment on the sloop but find out everything you can about the other three ships. Our sensor picture should clear up quite a bit as we get closer to the Beta Field’s edge. I want information specifically on what weapons they’re carrying. Understood, Jack?”
“Aye, sir,” Truesworth answered as he manipulated the BigEye controls at his console.
Heskan shifted in his seat. He knew that he should be refining his battle plan with the three pirate ships based on the recent events but all he wanted to do was run to the front of his ship and see exactly how bad things were. How am I supposed to concentrate when all hell could be breaking loose in the bow of my ship?
“Boats?” Heskan questioned impatiently.
Chief Brown looked up from his console. “They’re there, sir. Lieutenant Riedel should be in contact shortly.” As he spoke, Brown subtly moved his hand in a “slow down” gesture but softened the mild rebuke with a supportive expression and nod at his captain.
Heskan caught the meaning immediately and simply said, “Thank you, Chief.”
Three minutes passed and Selvaggio announced that Anelace was at relative rest at the edge of the Beta Field. Truesworth focused the ship’s powerful sensors, which were now able to fully burn through the edge of the Beta Field’s interference on the approaching fleet. An involuntary gasp escaped the young ensign but he recovered quickly and spoke in a neutral tone. “Captain, we have a clear sensor picture of the ships now. I’m putting them on screen.” The tactical plot updated and the activity on the bridge stopped in unison.
“I santi ci protegga,” whispered Selvaggio.
Heskan saw two pirate ketches flanking an enormous, two hundred fifteen meter long schooner. The menacing ship was over twice the size of Anelace. Only Lieutenant Vernay’s furious typing on her console could be heard as the rest of the bridge crew stared in mute silence at the beast.
Chapter 15
“Only one big guy,” Heskan said to break the silence. “Okay, Jack, start snooping and tell me what they’re packing.”
The spell broken, the bridge crew resumed their duties. After a few moments, Truesworth replaced the optical of the sloop wreckage by dividing the right side of the large main screen into thirds. Each third showed the two-minute lagged optical of one of the three remaining pirate ships. Anelace had already identified the class of each ship and was now hard at work comparing the “textbook” picture of that ship with the actual image of the ship on the screen, searching for discrepancies. Truesworth quickly spotted two ominous bumps on the hull of one ketch that, upon closer inspection, could only be B-pack lasers. The examination continued and with each discovery, he tagged the placement and type of each weapon system on the tactical plot. The ensign knew each of the bridge crew would be alerted to the tactical updates and they could simply touch the updated ship on the miniature versions of the tactical plot on their console screens to bring up a three-dimensional representation of the target and its status.
Heskan did just that as his sensor officer detected and classified the weapons on the pirate ships. Ketch-One was a laser boat, identical to Raptor. B-pack lasers were discovered on the much larger schooner as well. Two appeared on the bow of the ship. Soon two more B-packs were identified on each side of the frigate-sized vessel. The ship’s tactical was updated a third time, increasing the count of side-mounted B-packs to four on each side.
Ten B-pack lasers, Heskan thought. By itself, it outguns us on lasers over two to one. Still, it could be worse. A nagging thought picked at Heskan. Maybe it is.
“Are you finished with the weapons estimate on that big bastard, Jack?”
“Yes, Captain, the preliminary is done and I’m looking over the last ketch. I was intending to go back over each one again once I got the preliminary examination finished.”
“Search real hard for missile ports, Jack. I know they’ll be almost impossible to see with the interference and from this angle but they’ve parked themselves two light-minutes out from us for a reason.”
Truesworth had just enough time to acknowledge before Vernay declared, “The mass driver is now functional, Captain.”
“Good work, Stacy. You and your team did a great job on that sloop.” Heskan’s comm unit alerted him to an incoming call from his first officer. He stabbed the panel and said, “Go ahead, Mike.”
“We’ve made it to the mass driver control room, sir.” The torment in Riedel’s voice easily carried over the connection. “It’s… it’s a mess in here. Douglas and McKinley are KIA. Bonner seemed uninjured but he kept insisting that McKinley was alive so I sent him to the med station to be looked over. The room is wrecked, sir. I can see directly into the liquid storage tanks. There’s no atmosphere in here so the containment field generators must be destroyed. We can probably make it airtight in an hour with a portable generator but I don’t think much of the control room’s equipment is functional.”
Heskan’s mind raced to process the damage report. “What about the other compartments?”
“They are a little better than L-Two. The ship’s mess containment fields are operational but I didn’t look at non-combat essential equipment.”
Heskan noticed that Truesworth had identified Ketch-Two as possessing top and bottom mounted railguns as Riedel continued. “I’m afraid Murrell is KIA too. DC-Two is destroyed and the gym took some minor hits but that’s it.”
Heskan sighed as he heard the news of another crewmember killed in action. Dana Murrell would have finished her tour on Anelace in five months and was looking forward to going home to Orthosie to pick up her family’s tradition of agriculture. Her father, a retired chief petty officer, had insisted that his children serve the Republic before they planted their roots back home. “Okay, just seal off L-Two then get back up here, Mike,” Heskan said. He looked over toward Chief Brown somberly. “Did you hear, Chief?”
Brown nodded curtly. “Yes, Captain. I can have Damage Control Stations One and Three cover for DC Two. I’ll update you as soon as we’ve got L-Two sealed up.”
With the damage report in, Heskan allowed himself a moment to reflect. The logical part of his brain told him that they had been lucky. The damage sustained could be compensated for and the loss of life would not reduce the ship’s combat capability. Heskan knew this was true. Nonetheless, he felt like a complete failure. A pissant sloop has wrecked four compartments and killed three crewmembers. Durmont will relieve me of command the second he can an
d I’ll be grateful for it. The faces of the three crewmembers flashed through his head. How am I going to tell their families? It’s my fault, my responsibility. Heskan’s vision blurred as his eyes began to moisten. He clenched his teeth so hard he thought they might crack when a stern voice from the past echoed inside his mind; it is your responsibility so shoulder it, you idiot. The Brevic Republic is depending on you. Do. Your. Job. Anger began to build from deep inside Heskan as he willed his vision to refocus on the main tactical. He thought briefly back to the Raptor and the guilt he had felt for its destruction. This time, he had been so concerned for his own ship that he had felt nothing after Cloak’s demise. Now, as he glared at the remaining pirate fleet, he felt the embers of burning hatred transforming into grim resolve.
As anticipated, the pirate fleet had come to rest 2lm from the Beta Field edge. All three of the ships now faced Anelace, providing a minimal profile for her optics to analyze. Truesworth had confirmed no further weapons but he had added speculative twin missile ports to each of the schooner’s broadsides, surmised from a sensor/control suite that he had identified on the hull of the schooner.
The likely presence of missile ports was bad news. Although slower than lasers and mass driver shots, missiles had far greater range. They also had guidance packages that would allow them to be directed from launch to impact by the controlling ship or to home in on their targets independently. Missiles also didn’t require a direct hit and could damage their target with a near miss, depending upon the warhead installed. The only downside to missiles was that point defense systems could shoot down incoming missiles before they reached their target.
Heskan brought the ship down from battle stations to high alert before saying, “Jack, change the beacon on the Narvi buoy to red.”
The ensign acknowledged and sent a coded signal to the navigation buoy near the Narvi tunnel point. When the buoy received it, its beacon would change from green to red and an automated message would be sent to any ship diving out of the tunnel point, ordering it to execute an immediate jump back to Narvi. The automated message would also include an update of the system’s situation and an official request for additional Brevic naval forces. Skathi would be closed to all non-military traffic until the beacon was switched back to green but the measure was a small comfort to the crew, as they knew help would not be coming for at least nine days after the next freighter dove into Skathi.
For better or worse, the situation here will be very different when help arrives, Heskan considered.
Lieutenant Riedel entered the bridge, looked at the main screen and nearly stopped in mid-stride. After a few seconds, he said almost casually, “I see you were right about an enforcer ship, Captain.”
“It would appear so,” Heskan replied.
“Incoming message from the schooner, Captain. Voice only,” Truesworth said as he relayed the message to play over the bridge speakers.
“Anelace, this is the flagship, Blackheart. You will approach my squadron at point zero five light with shields lowered and weapons powered down or you will be annihilated.”
Heh, they know our name. I guess that shouldn’t surprise me. “Jack, send this to Blackheart.” Heskan hit the record button on his console and spoke in a casual tone, “Blackheart, this is BRS Anelace. Your squadron is running without operating beacons or proper identification in violation of commerce and space-going regulations. Your vessels will power down their engines and power cores and prepare to be boarded for citation for these offenses.”
Ensign Truesworth gave a quizzical expression and then moments later answered, “Sent, Captain.”
Lieutenant Riedel leaned in close to Heskan. “You mean to disarm them with humor, Captain?”
“Unlikely,” Heskan shrugged, “but I don’t want them thinking we’re beaten. We aren’t finished yet, I swear to you.”
“I have not yet begun to fight,” Riedel said softly.
“What?” Heskan asked.
“Over a millennium ago, a Terran wet navy captain faced an enemy, fifty-gun frigate. Even though he was outmatched, he engaged the enemy. Partway through the battle, the ships sailed close enough to each other that the enemy crew actually called out to his damaged ship and taunted him. The navy captain hollered back, ‘I have not yet begun to fight.’ Three hours later, it was the enemy frigate that surrendered.”
“Let’s hope history repeats itself, Mike.”
“Indeed, sir. Your orders?”
Heskan leaned back to consider his options. “What I’d like to do is wait in the Beta Field until help arrives. Time is on our side.”
“You could always ask for two weeks to consider their demand for our surrender,” Riedel quipped.
Heskan smiled. “I’m pretty sure they won’t wait that long,” he responded. “What concerns me is they have the RALF as leverage. They’d never get me out of the Beta Field if that wasn’t here.”
Riedel scratched his head. “So they wait around for us to come out, get frustrated when we don’t and then threaten to blow up the RALF unless we come out?”
“That’s what I would do but they’ve already made some mistakes. That schooner has to have missiles. If it didn’t, it would have a lot more B-packs or a bunch of large caliber railguns.” Heskan pointed at the tactical plot. “They’re resting two light-minutes from us. I bet you that is the limit of their missile range. They aren’t expecting us to surrender, so when we come out to fight them, they can open up on us immediately and put us on the defensive… maybe even destroy us before we can reach them.”
Riedel nodded. “But that’s a mistake. We’ll have closed some of the distance before our light even reaches the pirates showing them we’ve moved and the schooner will still have to turn to get its broadside facing us.”
“Yup, and I doubt they’ve fought a navy ship before. Our defense platforms are a lot better than anything they’re used to and, with the damage to Ana’s bow, they may even think the sloop took out our mass driver.”
“Ensign Selvaggio,” Riedel asked, “how fast can that schooner turn her broadside to us?”
“Depending on the crew, roughly twenty to forty seconds, sir.”
“Plus, Mike,” Heskan pointed out, “look at the formation. The ketches are a full twenty light-seconds in front of the schooner. From their point of view that makes sense because they want to keep us away from their missile boat and they’ll have to close with us anyway to use their lasers and railguns.”
“But they’re overextended,” Riedel said as he nodded in understanding.
“Yes. To them, we’re just an outmatched, damaged corvette and they have three undamaged ships, including an enforcer ship. I bet all three of those captains are real eager to notch a naval vessel on their belts. In fact, my guess is if we charged them, those ketches would actually come toward us.”
“So what do we do, Captain?”
“We wait. Maybe they’ll charge us and then we can split them up some in the Beta Field. That’d be nice,” Heskan wished. “But I won’t change our position without a good reason, not when time is on our side.”
A few seconds passed as the officers considered their predicament. Lieutenant Riedel began to speak but was cut short by an incoming message.
“Anelace, this is Blackheart. You have twenty minutes to strike your lights and surrender. Approach my squadron at point zero five light with shields lowered and weapons powered down.”
Heskan exhaled heavily as he considered the demand. “That’s interesting. He didn’t threaten us with annihilation this time. I wonder if that means he knows he can’t chase us in here.”
“Your reply, Captain?” Truesworth asked.
“None, Ensign.”
Twenty minutes passed without action and two minutes after that Anelace received another voice message. “Captain of the Anelace, surrender immediately or I promise I will kill every one of your crew while you watch.”
Heskan looked over to Truesworth. “Did that sound a little cranky to you?
Let this be a lesson to you young ensigns that bad manners get you nothing.” Heskan looked over to Riedel. “You record the reply… tell them the captain has retired to his quarters with instructions not to be disturbed. Inform him I’ll hear the message in a little over eight hours.”
Riedel cut short a laugh and with a big smile replied, “You’re not going to make his Christmas card list that way, Captain.”
Several minutes later, Heskan had placed his engagement plan up on the main screen and was explaining it to his crew when the angry response came back. “You think you’re cute? Let’s watch your captain laugh when we blow that mining base to hell.”
The words made Heskan grimace. “Damn, I was hoping he’d get frustrated and charge us but he’s playing it smart.” Looking at the opticals, he saw the three-ship squadron begin turning away from Anelace and toward the RALF. That information is two minutes old so figure thirty seconds to turn toward the RALF, which means they’ve been under way at point one light for ninety seconds… that makes them one hundred twenty-nine light-seconds from us. His quick math was confirmed by the tactical plot, which had projected an estimation of the squadron’s current position given the time-late data. It’s time to act.
Heskan sounded battle stations as he barked commands, “Navigation, intercept Ketch Two, maximum speed. WEPS, rig your Lyles for point defense. Engage Ketch-Two with the main battery when in range. Sensors, I want identification on the missiles the second you pick them up; run ECM Suite Beta in the meantime.”
He gripped the arms of his command chair. “We’re going in.”
Chapter 16
Anelace shot from the edge of the Beta Field under maximum acceleration. Pulling g-forces that would crush the crew without her inertial compensators, she hit her sprint speed of .33c in just thirty seconds. The corvette streaked across space to close the 129ls distance between the ships by 22ls before the pirates even saw her begin to move.
