“What if they go straight overhead?”
“If their sensor team is incompetent, hungover and blind, they might not see us.”
“Not much we can do to influence that.”
“No, sir. It gets worse.”
“Always does before it gets better.”
“Our FTL comms booster isn’t functioning. It’s only showing an amber, but it won’t let me put anything in the transmission queue. The hardware protrudes through the hull in six places and best guess is it all got burned out by the high temperatures.”
“So we’re cut off from base?”
“Effectively. I can send a sub-light comm, though we’ll all be long dead from old age before it gets anywhere near its destination. If the cruiser doesn’t kill us first.”
The options list was getting progressively shorter and losing the FTL comms was a kick in the balls that Recker wasn’t ready for. He took a deep breath and insisted to himself that only a fool got hung up on the immutable.
“See what you can do.”
Burner gave a tight-lipped smile. He didn’t say the words, but it was clear he wasn’t expecting the FTL comms to work again. Recker didn’t press him on it.
“What did you find out about that cylinder?” he asked instead, raising a hand to forestall the objections. “I’m not expecting a detailed report.”
“The outer casing was a metal alloy of some kind, sir, of a type unknown to us. It was also extremely dense, but I was able to direct a lightspeed ping through the middle. The area the ping hit was partially hollow.”
“That’s still a lot of material to bring out here,” said Aston.
“What purpose does the cylinder serve?” wondered Recker. “It’s not likely to be benign.”
“I gathered a whole lot of raw data, sir,” said Burner. “I just haven’t had time to analyse it.”
“And now we can’t transmit to base.”
“If it’s any consolation, there’s too much data to go in an FTL comm, sir, given the limitations of riot class hardware.”
“Start looking at what we’ve got anyway. If you uncover something, it might save time later.”
“Yes, sir.” Burner looked like he had something more to say.
“Tell me, Lieutenant. I don’t care if it ends up incorrect.”
Burner took a fevered swig from his coffee and placed the empty cup on the floor. “Well, sir. I think most of that cylinder is there to generate power for something else.”
“There wasn’t anything else, Lieutenant. Except that cruiser.”
“No, sir, I mean that the cylinder performs more than one function. It generates power for something else also contained within the casing.”
“Any guesses as to what?”
“Not yet. It may be in the raw data.”
“Check it out.”
Burner still wasn’t finished. “There’s more, sir. I ran the composition of the alloy through our database and it’s completely new. We’ve been fighting the Daklan for years and this is the first time we’ve encountered that material.”
Recker was sure this was significant, though how exactly, he couldn’t be sure. He turned to Commander Aston.
“How much damage did our missiles inflict on the cylinder?”
“I can only confirm sixteen detonations on target, sir. You saw how big that thing was. A riot class is designed to knock out armoured vehicles and cargo vessels. Against anything else we’re little more than a nuisance.”
“That’s not what the captain of that destroyer was thinking when our missiles took him down.”
“Thank you, Lieutenant Burner,” said Recker. “Sometimes we can punch above our weight, but however you look at it, we’re lacking firepower. Let’s assume the cylinder didn’t fall over.”
“If Lieutenant Burner is correct and it’s hollow, then a bunch of missiles into the operational section would give the Daklan something to think about. That’s if the armour isn’t two hundred metres thick.”
It was food for thought, even if the Finality wasn’t in a position to launch a second attack and likely never would be.
“Let’s see what progress we make on our other priorities before we think about anything else, Commander.”
“Yes, sir. What do you want me to do?”
“Watch out for our fleet coming in so that Lieutenants Burner and Eastwood can work without interruptions.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll back them up.”
The crew were professionals and Recker left them to it. He knew himself well enough to recognize that the coming minutes, hours or however long it took for the next development, would be difficult. They were in a situation that wasn’t all-out combat - where reflexes and adrenaline took over - nor was it a time that allowed for any form of relaxation. It was an in-between place that took the worst aspects of an engagement, whilst removing any possibility of influencing events.
A couple of hours passed and the hull slowly cooled. The air outside was sub-zero, but each of the Finality’s armour plates was a big slab of alloy and it would be many more hours before they reached anything near ambient. Still, it was a positive sign that the cruiser hadn’t found them yet.
As time went by, Recker experienced a creeping fatigue – it had been a long shift even without the stress of the twin engagements. Sleep wasn’t an option, but he didn’t want to make an error because he was tired. The pocket on his spacesuit held pills that would help, though he was reluctant to take them so soon. Once he was running on boost, every decision would seem too easy and he didn’t want to surrender to drug-induced overconfidence.
Plan B – caffeine - was tried and tested, and Recker ordered a coffee from the replicator. The taste was bad enough that he was tempted to pour it away and take the boosters anyway, but he forced himself to drink it quickly.
In other circumstances, Recker would have left the bridge and spoken directly to the soldiers. Ten years ago, he’d been one of them and could well recall the nervous tension of waiting in cramped quarters, exchanging terse, unfunny wisecracks with the other troops and hoping there wasn’t a swarm of Daklan missiles heading your way.
Right now, Recker couldn’t go anywhere. Even so, with no immediate requirement to fly the spaceship, he spoke regularly to his crew to see if he could help.
“What’ve we got, folks?” he eventually asked, after a total of four hours underground.
“Still working on it, sir,” said Eastwood. “We took a beating and I’m having to audit some of the backup support systems before I can concentrate on the engines.”
“Lieutenant Burner?”
“I’ve got some preliminary ideas, sir.”
“Let’s have them.”
Burner didn’t get an opportunity to discuss those ideas. He spotted something on his console which made him jump in surprise. “Sir, I’ve detected a fission cloud near Etrol!” he said. “The magnitude and pattern indicate it’s another riot class.”
In two steps, Recker was at his console and he dropped into his seat. Aston had the information on the tactical already and he stared in dismay.
“Two hundred thousand klicks and straight over the top of the cylinder. Shit, get them on the comms!”
“I’m trying, sir,” said Burner. “It’ll take a few minutes for their sensors and comms to recalibrate after they exit lightspeed.”
“What’re they doing coming in so close in the first place?” said Recker angrily. “If the lightspeed calcs were even a fraction out, they could have appeared in the centre of the planet.”
“They must have been ordered to take the risk, sir,” said Aston. She swore under her breath. “Here’s a second fission cloud, right on top of the first. Another riot class.”
“Get that comms channel!” yelled Recker.
“I’m trying, sir. Still nothing.”
Against the Daklan cruiser in a normal engagement, two riots were utterly outmatched. Add to that their vulnerability when emerging from lightspeed and this would be over in moment
s if the enemy were quick to react.
“Got a channel to the Sunder,” said Burner. “I’ve broadcast an emergency get the hell away message. Now the Brimstone has joined the channel.”
The two spaceships were out of the Finality’s sensor sight, but they broadcast their positional and tactical data automatically, which appeared on Recker’s console. Like Aston said, they were low and overhead.
A red dot appeared on the shared tactical, travelling fast.
“Shit, no,” said Recker.
“Both the Sunder and the Brimstone report an engagement with a superior opponent, sir.”
Smaller green and red dots, representing missiles, raced across the tactical. The Sunder vanished from the screen before the heavy cruiser’s first salvo was halfway there.
“Terrus cannon,” said Aston.
A moment later, the Brimstone also vanished.
The one-sided conflict was over almost before it had started. As soon as the HPA ships stopped broadcasting, the desolator disappeared from the Finality’s tactical, leaving the screen empty once again.
Recker closed his eyes and tried to control his fury.
Chapter Seven
For ten minutes, the crew of the Finality said little as they watched and waited to discover if any more HPA ships were inbound. None came.
“What’s done is done,” Recker said eventually.
The crew looked at him and he knew they were waiting for him to offer some hope. Recker didn’t know what to tell them and stayed quiet while he thought.
“That’s our backup gone,” he said at last. “If we’re getting out of here, we’ll be doing it alone.”
“Maybe there are others coming our way, sir,” said Burner. “If Admiral Telar diverted warships from different places, they wouldn’t arrive at the same time.”
“It’s possible,” said Recker. “But I’m not pinning anything on it happening.”
“That means we’re escaping,” said Aston.
“I don’t plan to die on Etrol,” said Recker.
“Nor me, sir.”
“Escape just became a whole lot more important,” said Burner, his face draining of colour.
“You found something in the data?” asked Recker striding to the comms station.
“Not in the data, sir. It’s been staring me in the face all along, but I only just realised.”
Burner was studying a screen filled with apparently random letters and numbers – the raw data from the sensors – and he’d plotted a series of charts on an adjacent screen.
“You said it wasn’t in the data,” said Recker.
Burner tapped the side of his head to show where the idea came from. “Sometimes you have to look away from the details and see the bigger picture. I asked myself what requires a power source the size of the one housed in that cylinder and there are only two possibilities.”
“Weapons and propulsion,” said Recker.
“Yes, sir. But that cylinder must be anchored at least a thousand metres underground in order to stay upright.”
“Which means it’s not about to fly anywhere.”
Burner nodded vigorously like a converted zealot. “It’s got to be a weapon.”
“That doesn’t necessarily follow,” said Aston, though her expression told its own story.
“How come?” asked Recker.
“The Daklan could be working on all kinds of experimental kit that we don’t know about. Not everything they create is intended to kill.”
“Isn’t it? They live for war, Commander. All I ever see is examples of how they’re trying to get better at it. More efficient.”
“I know, sir. We should consider everything.”
Recker sighed. “While we’re out here and until I see evidence to the contrary, I’m assuming that cylinder is a weapon. For all the difference it’ll make.”
Aston let it drop, confirming that she agreed with Recker and Burner’s assessment. If she disagreed strongly enough about something, she had no fear about making her views plain. Some commanders thought that saying yes to everything was a good way to advance their careers. Aston wasn’t one of them.
“Our backup is gone,” Recker repeated. “The HPA military has lost some good personnel. We’re not going to be next, which means we’ve got to escape from Etrol and make it back home to let high command know what we’ve found. Maybe they’ll send more warships out here, whatever happens to us. If they don’t, the HPA will be missing out on some vital intel.”
“I’ll do what I can to prepare the aft module for restart, sir,” said Eastwood. “Are you hoping to fire it up while we hide in this canyon?”
“I don’t know,” Recker confessed. “If we limp out on one module, there’s a greater chance the desolator will find us. If we head out on both modules, they might detect our ternium trail.”
“Either way, we’re hoping the dice will roll in our favour,” said Eastwood. He grinned. “Don’t you love it?”
“Not much.” Recker smiled anyway. “You’re suddenly the most important member of the crew. If you need assistance, ask.”
“Will do.”
Recker got himself another coffee and his growling stomach prompted him to request a cheeseburger from the replicator menu. A banner advising him to limit his saturated fats intake appeared on the screen and the effects of seeing it elevated his blood pressure more than any fifty burgers would have done.
When the machine was finished vending, Recker found his coffee in the slot, but his cheeseburger was nothing more than a pile of grey sludge which smelled like warm mince. He swore and re-entered his cheeseburger order with the same outcome.
“Now the damn replicator’s faulty,” he said.
“Try ordering something else,” Aston suggested.
Recker requested something easy – one of the nutrition blocks that formed part of a soldier’s emergency rations. A brownish object appeared, which he withdrew and studied.
“Looks like we’re stuck with the basics.” He bit into the block and found it bland with undertones of fermented vegetables.
“I thought you ground pounders couldn’t get enough of the grunt fuel,” said Aston with a grin.
Coming from most other people it would have been an insult or a bad attempt at humour, but Recker wasn’t offended.
“It’s like chewing cardboard,” he laughed. “You’ll have to get used to it, Commander, since I think it’s the only food this machine is going to produce.”
“I’m not hungry, sir.”
“You’ll crack.”
“Never.”
Recker took another bite from the block and concluded the nutritionists hadn’t done anything to improve on the taste in the last eighteen years. “How’s it going, Lieutenant Eastwood?” he asked.
“I’m making progress, sir.”
Recker leaned closer to have a look. The screens on Eastwood’s consoles were covered in data tables, routing diagrams and schematics.
“What kind of progress?”
Eastwood tapped a thick finger on a side-by-side representation of the spaceship’s two engine modules. “Normally when you shut down a ternium module, it requires a huge charged burst from another power source in order to align the molecules, at which point they become agitated and…”
“I know the background, Lieutenant.”
“Well, our forward propulsion module doesn’t theoretically have enough grunt to fire up the aft module.”
Eastwood was getting animated as he usually did when talking about this kind of stuff and Recker felt it rubbing off on him.
“You’ve found a way to overcome the limitation?”
“Yes. Maybe. I think so.”
Recker stared. “So which is it?”
“When they create these ternium blocks, the fabrication plant subjects them to a one-off overstress test where they create a semi-stable alignment within the structure and they hold it there for a couple of hours with the module at three hundred percent of its operational maximum. If th
e block passes the test, then it’s signed off for installation.”
“Aren’t those the tests they do inside heavily armoured underground facilities?” asked Burner, looking up from his station.
“That’s right,” said Eastwood. “As soon as they detect anomalies in the block, they shut it down and the whole thing gets sent back to the reprocessing plant, where it’s recreated from scratch.”
Recker guessed where this was heading. “You’re planning to overstress the forward engine module and use it to kickstart the aft one?”
“Yes, sir. Even if the kickstart fails, with the forward module in a semi-stable condition, we’ll have enough grunt to get out of here and at a greater maximum speed than if we had both modules functioning in their normal state.”
“Will that allow us to reach lightspeed?” said Recker.
Eastwood shook his head. “No such luck. The Finality’s mainframe works out the calculations and balances them evenly across both propulsion modules. We need both working in order to reach lightspeed.”
“Can we alter the programming?”
“If I’m honest, sir, I can probably do that. Eventually.” Eastwood scratched his head and looked pained. “It’s a big job – they have dedicated teams of software experts for this kind of work. I can’t guarantee I won’t break something.”
“How long can we safely hold the module semi-stable?”
“We can’t safely hold it semi-stable for any time whatsoever, sir.” Eastwood gave a gravel laugh. “That’s the answer I should give you. In reality, the module might run for a long time and still return to its normal state. Or it might become totally unstable, in which case we’re screwed.”
“Define screwed,” said Burner.
“Results of past failures are mostly non-explosive,” said Eastwood. “Usually the ternium heats to a few million degrees and destroys itself.”
“What about the other failures?”
“The HPA has experienced several more dramatic outcomes. Luckily, ternium only generates power when all the atomic ducks are in a row. Once things fall out of shape, it can no longer generate energy. It effectively kills itself before it can cause a catastrophic outcome.”
War from a Distant Sun (Savage Stars Book 1) Page 6