That was news to Tony. Heavy carriers had always been intended to make ocean landings. What better way was there to establish a presence on a captured world than to see one patrolling the oceans and launching its fighters? Heavy carriers were not just mobile launch platforms, but moving garrisons with everything a fleet needed to control a planet. Only light and escort carriers kept their hulls dry. “Ma’am?”
“The latest specs on the Barker’s follow-on are for a Pharad-inspired strike carrier. They’ll carry only a half-dozen squadrons and will rely more on their escorts for offensive capability. Overcommand thinks it will make for a more ‘nimble’ strike force.”
Commander Hernandez stepped up. “But ma’am, what about the reports from Yamato Staryards? Those new battleships of theirs could fill the void. I bet once they receive the data we have from the Inferno that it’ll make those turreted Razer canons they’ve developed even more impressive. And, they can act as carriers as well.”
That did bring a smile to the old woman’s lips. “Evolution and human innovation at its finest - Yamato’s xenophobia has finally paid off. The ships they’ve churned out the last few years have been the best in the fleet, and not a single nut or bolt was built with alien hands,” she went on, looking over her shoulder.
Tony followed her gaze. A clutch of alien crewmen, in color scheme reversed enlisted uniforms, were busy at their stations, restraint collars on several of the lower ranking ones. “I’m surprised you even allow Krad on the bridge, ma’am.”
“They serve their purpose,” she remarked as her handcomm beeped.
Tony waited in silence as the Admiral picked up the device and read through the message.
Her brow furrowed and face contorted into a slight scowl. “It seems that we were too late.”
“Ma’am?”
“The Powell was here, six months ago. We have ionization trails and bits of hull that match hers, but nothing to indicate she went up.”
“Could she have escaped the system?”
“It looks like she might have. Readings indicate she made a dark matter drive run, but the drive disengaged in the middle of nowhere. Six months on minimal drive, she could still be lost in that mess or might have limped to a jump point to try and escape.”
“There’s plenty of junk floating around out there. She could have collided with something while at high sublight and scattered her remains throughout the nebula,” Commander Hernandez commented. “After six months we’d never find anything more than random bits of high velocity debris. I’d not want to be on the receiving end of any of that.”
“Possibly, but Overcommand won’t let us move onto deeper raids without either rescuing the Powell, confirming its destruction, or,” she began with a sly smile. “Destroying the Wolfsbane.” She locked eyes with Tony. “And you LT Commander Nerant have handed us the way to do just that.”
UCSB Date: 1006.007
Griffclaw-209, Orcain System
Two short jumps away from the Altair Green Nebula, a tired Feral-F Bomber on solo recon patrolled the space around the little-traveled system’s sole jump point. Ordinarily after a battle of the scale the Wolfsbane had just engaged in there’d be a period of rest and downtime. A ship would fall back, lick its wounds and give the crew time to recover. Such was not the case after the battle in Drobile. As damaged as it was, the Wolfsbane was vulnerable and cut off from additional support. Captain Sardenon, convinced that the Barker might have found out and would take advantage of that, sent out patrols to determine just how vulnerable.
The pilot, Tred ‘Windjammer’ Vetig, rubbed his eyes and suppressed a yawn. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen a real bed. The tiny sleeping cubicles under the flight deck that the gunners were currently occupying didn’t count in his mind. He looked to his co-pilot, ‘Veatan:’ the man loved ancient things. At that moment, he was leafing through a dog-eared and highly faded printed paper graphic novel. He shook his head and looked back. The bombardier, ‘Graiden,’ and communications tech, ‘Blowfin,’ took turns flinging cards at one another from their stations opposite each other. They were a good crew. He just couldn’t decide if they were better or worse than the one he’d lost prior to his internment by, and rescue from, the Galactic Federation.
“What in the eighth layer of Sheol are we doing here?” Tred asked no one in particular.
“Sheol only has seven levels,” Veatan replied, eyes still glued to the centuries-old tale of superheroes. “If you’re going to blaspheme, at least get the numbers right.”
“Yeah boss,” Graiden called. “You wouldn’t want to face eternal judgement and find out god is a giant computer that really loves numbers,” the Otlian officer laughed.
Blowfin pointed towards the hatch to the bomb bay. “Sniffer said to come here, so we came here.”
“Why?” Windjammer asked. “This place is deader than a Geffer’s personality.”
Graiden flicked his next card towards Blowfin, knocked the card out of his outstretched hand. “Wasn’t always,” he remarked.
Rolling his eyes Tred turned back to the goat-faced officer. “Enlighten us, please.”
“Never mind,” Graiden replied and held up his target card for Blowfin. “Your turn.”
“No, I’m serious. I’m so bored and tired right now only stories about dead star
systems will keep me awake.”
“Fine,” Graiden replied as Blowfin’s card slapped against his. “This place was once full of life - my grandfather, he was born here.”
Veatan chuckled. “I’ve met your grandfather - this place was dead.”
“You want the story or not?” Graiden bleated.
The pilot waved his crew down. “Calm down people, let him continue.”
“Fine, grandfather was born on the innermost planet. Two of them used to be habitable,” he explained, shuffling his cards. “There were signs of serious mineral wealth below the surface so massive atmosphere processors were set up to make the air breathable.” Smiling, he pulled a card out and flung it at Blowfin’s upheld card. The card sailed across the space and tagged the card, flipping it out of his hand despite his death grip. Upon impact, the higher valued card activated a mesh in the meta-material target card that made it briefly too slippery to hold.
“Damn,” the Drashig hissed. “You all want in on this?”
“Nah, just tell us more,” Tred replied, Flinger never was his game.
“Your loss,” Graiden replied and tossed his cards across to Blowfin to shuffle. “So, the inner world looked to be covered in mineral wealth and the second looked like it might make a productive farming colony. The mineral wealth turned out to be the remains of some ancient civilization that had wiped itself out. There were wrecked vehicles, ships, aircraft and spacecraft all over. The xeno-archaeologists then moved in and declared it a protected planet before they picked it clean of anything they could find. Ruined the whole mining operation until they were done with it. Once the xeno-archs moved on the miners just gathered up what remained and shipped it off to be processed. I think I still have a knife made from the engine bell of an old rocket.”
“And the farm world?” Veatan asked.
“Getting there. The soil on the plains was fine, but below that was a layer of solid silicates. It looked like the planet had been glassed. So, of course the xeno-archs moved in, but breaking the glass released the radiation trapped within turned out that the soil had all washed off the mountains. So, they were pretty much all solid rock, no way to grow there. The whole system turned into a massive resource pit, but no one wanted to shut it down. Once the xeno-archs moved on, it took less than a generation to mine the first planet dry and move on.”
“Even petrochems?”
“There’s still some beneath the surface of the glassed world, but the risk just isn’t worth the reward, not with the nano-assemblers we have now.”
“So, like I said, it’s a dead system,” Windjammer commented. “So, what in Drig’s name are we doing here?”
“The sniffer…” Veatan responded before everyone cut him off.
“Said he felt an unusual amount of traffic transiting this jump point,” they all replied in unison.
“Which in and of itself warrants an investigation,” Veatan replied.
“But why us? Send a report to Command and the local militia can send a corvette to take a look. We’re hunting Geffers here.”
“The ion trails didn’t match any known Confed ship type, could be Geffers.”
“Could also be a ship that’s been damaged, trail didn’t match any known Geffer signature either.”
“Another good reason to check, boss,” Graiden called. “Could be one of ours in trouble, a damaged Geffer, possible first contact situation…”
“And I know the protocol,” Windjammer sighed. “Can’t a guy just complain? Where is our illustrious sniffer anyways?”
“I am here,” a soft voice replied from the airlock into the cavernous main weapons bay. The whole flight deck went quiet in response as he glided effortlessly into his jump seat. A mid-level psionic, he never extended so much as a hand to correct his course or pull himself into his seat. Reaching out with his powers however, he influenced the air around him to push him gently into it. He waited in silence in his seat as the harness wrapped around him and buckled into place while the rest of the crew watched and waited.
Frustrated by the utter lack of any news from the specially trained psionic, Windjammer called out. “Well?”
He felt a sharp pain behind his left eye, forcing him to recoil. He blinked several times, swearing that he’d felt something stabbing there before the pain had subsided. The sniffer turned to Blowfin. “Check all emergency bands. A ship, full of beings, many types, many races, they are in distress.”
“Right,” he replied, drawing out the word and set to work. Windjammer waited as he rubbed his eye. A moment later, hand to his ear, Blowfin turned to the pilot. “I have something. It’s weak, trying to punch it up.” He went silent for a moment, frustration masking his face.
“Adjust frequency by three hundredths of a period,” the sniffer commented, his voice as still as hull plate.
“Got it. Odd frequency. No Ident Code attached on any nearby sub-frequency. It’s not on any Confed Emergency band, unless…” Blowfin ran a few calculations on his terminal. “Unless, you’re plugging a Confed Emergency Band into a Geffer comm terminal.”
“Frag me, what kind of ship?”
“Listen for yourself.”
“... any friendly ship, this is the Odysseus. We are a transport out of Betelgeuse and are seeking asylum. Our ship was damaged fleeing Federation Forces, please, any friendly ship respond. We have women and children aboard that need medical attention. Again, this is Captain Sinon of the independent ship Odysseus to any friendly ship, we are in need of asylum and rescue.”
“It repeats after that, sounds like a ship full of defectors,” Blowfin commented. “Should I respond?”
Windjammer thought it over. Something felt off, but they had a duty to render aid and assistance to any stranded craft that showed no aggressive action, no matter its origin. “Do we have a rescue pod aboard?”
Graiden checked their supply inventory. “Two in the right nacelle launcher. Spinning them into position now.”
“Good. Give me a vector and encode a message that we’ll dispatch a rescue squad as soon as we return home.”
“You got it boss,” Graiden looked back at Blowfin and the Sniffer. “Any idea how many people?” he asked while encoding the message.
Blowfin shook his head as the Sniffer just sat there.
“Got it,” Veatan called, his comic book floating beside him. “The Odysseus is a known ship. Intel has a registry for a ship named Odysseus out of Betelgeuse. It’s a light transport, passenger capacity about 400 if everyone’s friendly and didn’t bring anything along.”
“Gotcha, bring in a Ferine or two and they should be fine. Either way, time for us to go home and report it. Bombardier?”
“Ready to go boss.”
“Launch the pods. Comm, see if you can pick up anything else. Let the big brain folks back on the ‘Bane clean up the signal. Launching pods now.”
The two pods launched in rapid succession and burned towards the near lifeless planet in the distance before their slipstream drives activated and both disappeared. “Well, that’s our good deed for the tridec. Let’s go home.”
UCSB Date: 1006.011
Fighter Hangar-5, UCSBS-Wolfsbane, Drobile System
The dull sound of a wrench clanking against the skin of a fighter three tiers up tore Blazer away from his own work with a start. He couldn’t help but stare up through the grating at the pilots grousing about having to do their own maintenance. The comment remained barely audible through the thinned atmosphere, but he could still hear it. Blazer shook his head and adjusted his mask as he looked up the length of the ship. Two tiers down, the temporary patch that had allowed them to pressurize the hangar stood out like an open wound, extending down two more tiers. Engineering crews were still busy there rebuilding the inner hull. For now, only a few sheets of armor was keeping the vacuum outside the ship, where it belonged.
He looked down into the avionics bay of his fighter, then the light on his former maintenance chief’s macomm blinked. Test complete. Blazer palmed the device with an ungloved hand and set it to perform the next test. Two cycles earlier he’d have been in full vac suit.
He resisted the urge to look across his tier, but felt his eyes drawn to the little alcove where the maintainers had used to wait for the squadron to return from a sortie. The same blast that had pierced the hull ripped the enclosure asunder, killing the maintainers stationed there. There hadn’t even been enough trace DNA left to identify them. They’d had to rely on the ship’s internal sensors to pronounce them dead, their tracking implants obliterated. It was the same all over the hangar. Holes and burns marked where small packets of pions had decayed during and after the blast.
“Attention, fighters landing, clear internal shaft to tier five,” the muffled PA announced.
Blazer looked about at the squadron’s craft. The Explosions’ fighters were being readied to leave, with maintainers from a half a dozen squadrons crawling over them. The Blade Force’s fighters were lower priority at that moment, leaving Blazer, Chris and Arion to see to their care. Those two were at lunch just then, but Blazer did see a familiar face floating onto the tier. “Ho, Trevis!”
“Ho, Blazer,” Trevis returned, loaded down with gear bags. The maintainers looked at Trevis with quizzical gazes. Blazer understood why. Instead of wearing a duty uniform, or even a flight suit, Trevis floated towards them in his ACHES. It made the already massive Tomeris look positively orcish.
“A little overdressed, aren’t you?” Blazer asked, trying to keep positive in this grim place, where so many had died.
Trevis slung his gear bags towards his fighter and thumped his chest. Tiny puffs from his armor forced him towards Blazer. “Nay. We be heading back to the Powell. If there being trouble on brew, we be needing to be geared up to be fighting.”
Blazer understood and noted the modified seal ring adapter around Trevis’ neck. It was the same type Gavit wore when he’d go on mission, allowing the ACHES to interface with a pilot’s helmet. “Are you expecting trouble?”
“Aye, of course. Once the Barker be showing her ugly red face, we be expecting tons.”
“I meant before that.”
Trevis scoffed. “I rather be prepared. Flight suits be crap for shipboard fighting. You be knowing that.”
Blazer unconsciously felt the spot on his arm where the Mini-Gorvian had torn his flight suit to shreds when it and its companions had boarded the Mercy. A chill ran down his spine in response to the memory of that cycle. The immeasurably alien eyes, the heat and necrotic smell of that Mini-Gorvian’s breath, the feel of its claws against his flesh. He’d never felt so vulnerable, so naked in battle, or so filled with fear. Only his
drive to protect Marda and his newborn son had kept him going. That that cycle had also marked the birth of his son was a stain he hoped would fade with time. He swore, even now, that he could see Gondral’s eyes in that abomination, eyes he’d had the chance to look into through the optics of his MeG-CE.
Blazer grabbed his hand away from his arm and took a calming breath. “Can you even fit in your cockpit in that suit?”
Trevis scoffed. “I barely be fitting in there naked, but we be managing.”
Blazer didn’t like the sound of that, or of heading off to the trap in a wounded Wolfsbane with half his squadron aboard a flying bomb. “Why is the Captain ordering you to transfer over there again anyway? Don’t we have a full squad of marines aboard ship to keep the ruse going?”
“Oy!” Trevis hollered at the techs handling his gear bags. “You best to being careful with those, me favorite guns be in there.” Satisfied, Trevis turned back to Blazer. “I not be knowing it all for certain. The Captain and Tadeh Qudas not be seeing the need to be telling me, but Porc be thinking it be some great honor. Since we be the ones capturing the Powell, we be getting to be the ones to be pushing the button,” he went on, shaking his head.
“I doubt that. The Captain will do that job himself.”
“Aye. We be there as window dressing. Like you be saying, we already be having a squad of marines and four psionics holding the bridge crew in line for when they be sending the bait signal. Though,” he went on, patting his chest. “We be having sealed orders for after we be arriving. Maybe the old wolf be having something in mind for us.”
Blazer scratched his nose. “I still don’t get the risk. Why not just relay the signal from the Wolfsbane, or some other ship, through the Powell?”
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