Obsidian Ressurection

by T J Bryan

  Toni could not keep herself from standing. "Mr. Ulf. How many of those dumbbells have we destroyed?"

  Lars replied, "22 to date. Hirst just nailed the 23d."

  "Hail Gunnr and Hirst. I want to know how many 'K's they have left. And Eir also."

  It was beginning to occur to Toni that the Megra might not only sacrifice their ships to clear the minefield, but they may also be doing the same to force the OCN to exhaust its supply of 'K's.

  Lars replied, "For Gunnr of her initial supply of 64 'K's she is down to sixteen. She has 6 casters left and her two torpedoes are available but will not fire them except upon your order. Hirst is better off with 31 remaining 'K's, all of her casters and torpedoes. Eir reports she has 22 'K's and a 18 casters as well as her two torpedoes."

  Toni thought a moment and consulted her inter-tab notes. "Have Gunnr fall back and take a position above New Kara. Inform Eir that if their supply of 'K's falls to below eighteen she is to do the same. Prepare the remaining SAR's to remain on station, for at least the next hour, but have them prepare to fall back."

  Toni cursed again. Why don't I have a supply ship to resupply our munitions? Here on Holgata I have another 100 'K's and casters but I have no way to get them to the fleet as it engages the Megra.

  Toni simply did not know how long the Megra would keep up the carnage, but she was taking no chances. The OCN had done well in the crowded area of the Severan Portal, and now of necessity they must engage the enemy in a more open expanse. Toni knew that if dozens more dumbbells came through and dispersed to attack the OCN from different directions her decision would have been a horrible mistake. But all her past experiences as well as her reading of battles past, indicated that the Megra held to a tight formation and in that formation they might well find their doom.

  Lars called out, "Gunnr is pulling back but she has determined that the most recent dumbbell to clear the portal is of the new type with the heavily armored connectors."

  Toni thought to herself, just like the last time. And soon we will see the Great Maw.

  "Mr. Ulf, have our remaining ships pull back and form a cone with New Kara at the center. I expect one of their big maws to appear soon and I would like some distance if you please."

  New Kara was well back of the Severan portal by almost 21 million kilometers and her SAR's could easily meet her within six hours on reaction engines. The dumbbells had always proven slower than SAR's and the new heavier more armored ships were slower still. At what Toni calculated was their best speed they were easily 12 hours from sailing into the kill zone of her repositioned OCN flotilla.

  "Mr. Ulf, give me a count at those armored dumbbells enter. I need to coordinate with Captain Smilot."

  Lars responded, "We have three in system now. They seem on a slightly slower heading that the previous ships. We are seeing them on a 32 minute interval. If they hold to that interval we should see our next dumbbell enter in about 10 minutes."

  "Very good Mr. Ulf. Let me know as each ship enters. Also if they change their heading and speed. I will be in my office." Toni walked the few steps into her office. She did not need to ask Lars to announce the entry of each ship since her status board was very complete, but it gave Lars something to do other than just sit there and watch. Further somehow it made Toni feel better just in case she missed something.

  Toni opened her vid-com and pinged Captain Smilot.

  Smilot's harried face appeared moments later. "Status Captain Smilot?" was all Toni said.

  Before responding, Toni could see Smilot looking about. She was standing in weapons center of the Monitor section of the station. Toni could hear her shouting and many voices responding. Then Smilot turned toward the vid-com and addressed Toni.

  "All well here in the war room, but its' chaos below with the refugee fleet. We have over a thousand badly injured and we are entirely swamped. Toni, I need you to take some of these badly injured folks. If you can't then many will die."

  Toni thought a moment. Those refugees may well die at Wu Station if the OCN could not repel the attack. But then again even if the OCN was successful they would die without help. She made a quick decision.

  "How many do we need to take and how can you get them here?"

  Smilot looked relieved. "You have 20 doc boxes and each one can take two folks. And you have those recovery beds as well. I will send you almost two hundred of our worst cases. I will send some in stasis tubes, but I will keep those the med staff say won't make it in time. Can you take that many?"

  "We will try," replied Toni.

  "They will be coming on the small liner Nimbus of Diana. She has sufficient reaction mass to make it to your station but not enough to return. And I have her leaving now. Four hours." Toni heard more shouting in the background as Smilot looked about.

  Toni thought a moment. "Smilot are any of those freighters serviceable? Could we use one to ferry replacement munitions to the battle fleet?"

  Toni could see Smilot turn to someone standing nearby. The Smilot replied, "Yes. We have two. Both will need fuel upon arrival at Holgata. I assume you have plenty."

  "Yes," Toni replied. "And crew, do they have a crew. Just a minimal one this may be another suicide mission so I want only volunteers."

  Smilot smiled, "Toni, they are all volunteers."

  "Good get them over here as fast as you can."

  Lars called out, "One more armored dumbbell entered. The count is now four."

  "Thanks Captain." Toni abruptly terminated the call to Smilot. She looked carefully at the status board and now four dumbbells were indicated hovering just outside the minefield. She paused a moment to wonder why they had stopped. They are waiting for others to form an assault fleet she thought.

  She pinged Dr. Billings on her vid-com and told him to be ready for 200 badly injured in about four hours. Billings almost blanched at the mention of 200, but he nodded his head, and as Toni terminated the call she could see him shouting orders to his staff.

  Then Toni pinged the dock master Arnold Schmitt. Arnold had served for years as a dock manager in the Commonwealth and had retired after 75 years on the dock. But when the call went out he responded and joined the OCN as dock master for Holgata.

  "I've been expecting your ping Toni."

  "Well I have bad news Arnold, and more bad news."

  "Ok, let's hear it."

  "We have 200 badly wounded arriving on a small liner in four hours. Actually in 3 hours and 53 minutes. You need to work with Dr. Billings on receiving them"

  "Yes," replied Arnold. "The good doctor is here now and we have been preparing."

  "Now the rest. I have two Diana freighters incoming at the same time. I am going to use one or both to restock our fleet with munitions. I need our crew ready to refuel the ships and load munitions."

  Toni saw Arnold draw a breath. Then he replied, "Can do Commodore. Can do. We have 96 'K's available, but on casters we have only those modified ones with the diamond dust. We have 101 of them. Since they have 30% less impact than the original casters we have not been allocating them to the fleet."

  "Well now is the time to test them Arnold." Then Toni asked, "How many of your dock crew have a med certificate?"

  Arnold replied, "Every one of them. All 26 of them."

  Lars called out "Another armored dumbbell has entered. Total count now five."

  Toni next pinged Silvi Karrlson on New Kara.

  Silvi answered, "Been busy Toni?" she asked.

  Toni almost laughed, but she felt a new stab of pain in her arm. She knew she had winced and that Silvi had seen it.

  "Silvi I want that cone formation we practiced. Try to mask the formation within the debris field. It might just confuse the Megra in targeting our ships. But withhold torpedoes until we think we have all of the Megra in one place. And I fully expect that big maw thing to appear at any moment and I am sure she will have some surprises for us, so let's be careful."

  Toni knew she was telling Silvi the obvious, but she was taking no cha
nces on any misunderstandings. Silvi would understand.

  As the hour passed three more dumbbells entered and joined the stationary Megra fleet. The total was now 13 and Toni knew they were not over.

  Then Toni had an idea. "Lars, is a heavy lifter, the ones we use for brining up assemblies and metal plate available on the moon?"

  Lars replied, "Yes Sir. There are three down there now."

  "Do we have staff on the moon?"

  "Two on maintenance. You want me to call them back?" asked Lars.

  "Yes, and have them bring that toroid thing, the one that holds the antimatter we can't use."

  Lars gave Toni an odd look and then turned to his comm to notify the skeleton crew on the moons surface. The trip from the moon's surface to Holgata was a speedy one and Toni knew they would dock at least one hour before the liner and the freighters arrived. In it's current configuration Holgata Station only had four berthing docks and as soon as the heavy lifter discharged its' cargo Toni intended to push the lander away. She needed to keep as much dock space clear as possible. If OCN ships were injured they would surely seek the comfort of Holgata station.

  Next Toni pinged the Master of Arms for the station. Brent Baxter answered. He was another retiree and former master blaster from the Miners Guild.

  Before Toni could speak Brent began, "We are moving the munitions to loading dock B and C right now. We will be ready, and I am coordinating with Arnold."

  "Good replied." replied Toni. "But I have another task for you and your crew when you are finished staging the munitions. Can you meet me at dock D in about forty minutes. Just after our heavy lifter arrives?"

  "Sure," Brent responded. "I'll be there."

  "Incoming. Another dumbbell. The count is now fourteen."

  Toni looked quickly at the status board. Somehow she had missed number thirteen. She thought to herself, now is not the time to loose focus. Then she pinged the next on her list of crew she needed ready for the coming onslaught of enemies, refugees and what she knew would eventually be damaged OCN ships.

  Lars continued his countdown of dumbbells and soon the number totaled 29. After an interval of another 55 minutes no other dumbbells entered the system. Toni hoped that they had finished their initial launch into the system, but as she felt another stab of pain in her arm she knew it was not over.

  Lars informed Toni that the lander had arrived and she left her office and rushed down to D dock. She entered the dock as the two maintenance operators were leaving the lander. They stopped upon seeing the Commodore and saluted. Toni returned the salute. "Welcome home," Toni said. "Did you bring that toroid bottle?"

  "Yes Sir," replied one of the men who looked to be no older than 16. His name tag read 'Karl Stallings.'

  "Your Eon's son?"

  Karl responded, "Yes Sir. And damn proud I am."

  "I knew your father well Karl. I miss him every day."

  "Sir." was Karl's only response as he stood just a bit taller.

  The Master at Arms entered the dock and saw Toni with the two maintenance crew. He rapidly crossed the dock followed by two of his own crew.

  "I'm here Commodore." Brent said. "Now what can I do for you."

  Toni responded, "Karl and,..." here Toni looked to the other name tag which read Neumont Thill. "Karl and Neumont, I want you to assist our Master at Arms here and remove that antimatter containment toroid. Bring it here on deck and when you are finished report to the dock master. He will have critical work for both of you."

  A few minutes later the odd shaped antimatter jar was brought onto the deck. The Jar seemed to have no real weight and was about a full meter in diameter.

  "How much is in that jar?" asked Brent.

  Toni replied, "No one knows. A drib or a drab, or a whole universe full. No one knows. The odd thing is that the bottle emits no anti-matter signature, but they did a lot of testing at the Collegium and they assure me that there is some inside. It's just how much is unknown."

  Brent continued, "You know since joining the OCN I have been reading up on this stuff. Our torpedoes carry only a tiny amount of the stuff. Less than a teacup full. When anti-matter encounters matter the result is pure energy. The two forces of the universe extinguish each other in and incredible burst of intense energy. It's kind of primal I guess."

  "And how do we detonate our torpedoes to unleash all that power?"

  "Actually its simple," replied Brent. "We simply smash the bottle. That's all that is needed. The bottle itself has enough matter to set the anti-matter off. There is on those torpedoes a simple chemical gun and it shoots a short iron rod into the bottle. The bottle then breaks. The primal forces of the universe combine and it goes boom."

  Toni looked down at the toroid. The thing had seen use and the physicists at the Collegium believed the container was some kind of reusable bottle, like a glass milk bottle found in the Habitat. How to remove it's contents had simply overwhelmed the Collegium staff so the toroid had been shipped here for investigation in a less dangerous environment. However events had overtaken the query into the bottle and it had sat on the moons surface for months.

  Toni looked hard at Brent. "Do you think we can rig this up to explode? By some remote control?"

  Brent kneeled down and ran his hands over the surface of the container. He took a long time before answering.

  "This container has seen a long time of use. The looks like a tough old bird and If I were to guess I'd say breaking it open would be hard and perhaps not possible with a conventional explosive. If your thinking of using it as a weapon we need a more definite way of ensuring it accomplishes its goal."

  "And?" asked Toni.

  Brent rubbed his chin in thought and then replied. "I want to make sure we blow the container open when you desire. My suggestion is to take the warhead from one of our anti-matter torpedoes and kind of glue it onto the top here. Then set a remote switch on the detonator. I don't see how any container, no matter how well designed, could sustain one of our torpedo warheads."

  "Very good. Mr. Baxter, you have an hour to rig this thing up."

  Brent smiled, "Won't take nearly that long."

  Toni checked her inter-tab and the count of dumbbells holding just outside Severan had remained constant at 29.

  Chapter One Hundred Thirteen

  Cranmore System - Destructor Ragnarök - Year 3248 October 14 ET 19:00

  Ana Arast reviewed her vid screen status again. 39 dumbbells and the Big Mouth had arrived earlier but upon forming a tight and tempting formation their fleet simply stood there not moving.

  Ana wondered, were the Megra awaiting additional ships, or was this some strategy newly developed in the face of OCN tactics, or perhaps a new weapons system on the Megra waiting to be deployed? She simply had no idea.

  The SARs Brynhildr and Hilda had returned to a position just above Borneo's moon Prince and they remained visible to the Megra fleet while Ragnarök remained hidden behind the moon. Ana's thinking was to draw the Megra into a chase of Brynhildr and Hilda, and then as they passed by the hidden position of Ragnarök, she would open up on them with everything she had. However 39 dumbbells would be impossible to destroy. If the Megra behaved nice, and came at her SAR's one at a time, and in line with even spacing, and they ignored the dead ships before them, then that strategy might work. But Ana knew that they would not be foolish and they would not allow a serial ambush to occur from behind the moon Prince.

  Ana had only two options. One was to run. Abel always advised this action in the face of overwhelming odds and in this case the odds were more than overwhelming. The second option was to do nothing and wait. Let the Megra make the next move and see how it might play out. After all here in the orbit of Prince, if they did not like the hand the Megra played they would easily make Girots portal before the Megra could catch them. However holding Cranmore was critical and the fall back to Girots was fraught with peril given that they had no real control over the Girots system. Spikey still lived there and although he seemed to
be perpetually sleeping his strength in arms was not to be ignored. No, thought Ana, I will make my stand here in Cranmore.

  Time passed and then seemed to simply crawl. The Megra fleet, tightly clustered around the Big Mouth had not moved in three days. Ana kept reviewing her options and kept arriving at the same conclusion. She would stay put and let the Megra make the first move, but they seemed to be playing the same game.

  On the fifth day of no action Ana had Hilda make a short run at the Megra fleet, but stop short of the kill zone. Her hope was to tickle them into some action that might reveal their intent. But they did not move. Hilda returned to her station above Prince.

  Occasionally the Megra seemed to launch probes but they were easily taken down by Brynhildr and Hilda from a long range. No probe had ever been close enough to see Ragnarök. Ana called a captains conference on vid. Eirik Njall of Brynhildr was first to appear followed moments later by Francine Peters of the Hilda.

  Ana opened the meeting. "I have no idea what the Megra are up to, but I am quite happy to simply sit here and twiddle my thumbs. At least I still have thumbs to twiddle."

  Francine laughed, "I agree. Greenland left seven days ago. She should make Wu in a for or five more days. Q Ball will notify Abel within a day and he will send whatever he can within a day or two. After Abel gets notice figure 16 days from Jamon to here. So if we are to get any help it will be no earlier than 22 or 24 days from today."

  Eirik Njall of Brynhildr spoke next. "I'm happy to just sit here, but I cannot keep from wondering why they do not attack. They could easily wipe both Hilda and myself out in a few hours of fighting, yet they just sit there. This makes no sense."

  Francine sat quietly for a moment. "But. What if they want us to attack. Say they are sitting there waiting for us to display our usual aggressive tactics and take the battle to them. That's one reason they might just be sitting out there tempting us."