“Aye, sir.”
“OPS, make sure the two monitor teams are back on watch in the cargo hold and keeping close tabs on our guest,” Jackson said.
“Uh, yes, sir,” Hayashi said.
“Guest?” Davis asked quietly.
“I’ll fill you in on that in a bit,” Jackson said. “Apparently we got more than we bargained for from our new friends.”
Chapter 13
“So in addition to the AI personality that inhabits the tracking cube, the Vruahn also sent a larger container full of specialized munitions that should help us get one of the big Alphas down and out.” Jackson remembered to look at the camera on his terminal and not the screen itself that showed the other four Ninth Squadron captains.
“Is there any sort of failsafe in case things get out of hand once we begin the actual capture attempt?” Captain Oliva Forrest asked. “Something that we can blow the Alpha with if we feel like we’re losing control over it?”
“Nothing from the Vruahn, but I’ve got my own chief engineer working on exactly that sort of device.” Jackson shook his head. “We’ll wire up a few high-yield warheads and put them in place to make sure we have a way to maintain ultimate control.”
“So what’s our next move?” Celesta Wright asked.
“Once the Ares is FMC we’ll redeploy into a staggered column and continue on to the Zulu jump point,” Jackson said. “I’m working with the Vruahn computer to develop what I hope will be an operational plan that will keep all five of our ships out of range of their plasma weapons while still accomplishing the mission.
“I decided to brief you like this since every time we use the main conference room the scuttlebutt on the ship spreads like wildfire, and it’s usually distressingly accurate. Please brief your individual crewmembers that will ever be put in a position of commanding your respective vessels. I’m having my XO set up an encrypted data stream through the Link that will allow you access to everything I see and hear from the Vruahn cube. Are there any questions?”
“Not enough information to have any questions,” Forrest quipped quietly. She and Jackson had been engaged in a long-running cold war that went all the way back to when he’d first assumed command of the Blue Jacket. He narrowed his eyes slightly, but let the comment go.
“That’s all I have,” he said slowly. “I’ll give you one final update before we transition out and then it’ll be com silence protocols again once we arrive in the Zulu System, at least until I get a feel for the local space. Any questions or requests you have will need to be addressed before we depart. Dismissed.”
“I see Captain Forrest is still as pleasant as ever,” Davis said once the terminal confirmed it was disconnected.
“I think it’s almost done out of habit now,” Jackson said. “She does have a point though. I’m not giving them much information to work with right now.”
“Is there a particular reason for that, sir?” she asked, moving unnecessarily close to him to grab the auxiliary microphone she’d hooked up for the video conference.
“I want the time we have left before the transition to get a better feel for whatever the hell that thing is in my hold,” he said as two sets of ingrained instincts fought each other over what reaction he should have to her proximity, one as a commanding officer and the other as a male that was too close to a beautiful woman. “I also don’t want a lot of second-guessing or arguing when they get their assignments. I’m not fighting this battle by committee.”
“Understood,” she said, finally, mercifully, moving away and back around the desk. “We should be getting close to firing the mains.”
“Hopefully.” Jackson stood and smoothed out his utility top. “Go ahead and relieve Hayashi on the bridge. I’ll be up shortly.”
“Yes, sir.”
****
“Magnetic constrictors are at full power,” Ensign Hayashi reported from the OPS station. “Fields are stable. Engineering is asking for the go ahead to prime the injectors and start generating plasma.”
“Tell Engineering to go ahead.” Jackson sat in his seat. “They’re clear to do whatever Commander Singh feels is necessary to get this ship underway without asking for specific permission.”
“Aye, sir. I’ll let them know.”
It was only another thirty minutes before Jackson could see the plasma chambers on both main engines go hot, and the temperature and pressure began to rapidly climb into operational levels. He checked the status of his ship’s navigation systems, including the attitude jets and thrusters, while his crew continued to get the destroyer ready to fly and fight after the power cutoff.
“Helm, you are clear to stabilize our flight with thrusters only,” he ordered. “Nav! I want a heading that puts us back on course for the Zulu jump point.”
“Sending new course to the helm now, sir,” the petty officer at Nav said. Jackson had never seen her on the bridge before and idly wondered where Specialist Accari was. He checked her course and saw that it was a decent compromise between trying to make up lost time and not having to run the engines too hot just after a cold start.
“OPS, confirm with Engineering that we’re cleared for normal flight,” he said.
“Engineering has turned over control of the engines to the helm,” Ensign Hayashi said. “They’ve cleared us for normal flight mode.”
“Very good.” Jackson spoke up, “Let’s get this mission back on track. Helm, engage along your new course, all ahead two-thirds.”
“All engines ahead two-thirds, aye.”
Jackson grimaced as the loud bangs and pops of the engines smoothing out jolted the deck. The Ares was significantly lighter than his old ship, the Blue Jacket, and relied much more on exotic materials and clever structural engineering to keep her straight while the stresses of interstellar flight were imparted on her hull. When the mains were brought back up from a cold start all the little burps of the plasma feed smoothing out were felt much more starkly in the lighter ship and always gave Jackson the irrational impression that Tsuyo had sent him out to fight the Phage in a beer can. One could say what they wanted about the low-tech approach to starship construction of a century ago, but they couldn’t deny that the Blue Jacket had taken a horrific beating at the hands of a Phage Alpha and kept coming back for more. The Ares had never really been tested in the same way and as such Jackson just couldn’t put the same faith in the new Starwolf-class that he did in his old command.
“Engine output has stabilized, Captain,” Hayashi said after another twenty minutes of powered flight. “ETA to our transition acceleration point is now … thirty-one hours, eighteen minutes.”
“Thank you, Ensign,” Jackson stood up. “Lieutenant Davis, you have the bridge for the remainder of the watch. Split the duty roster up so that First Watch is back on when we’re approaching the jump point. Everyone stay sharp, there is no reason to assume that those three Alphas won’t return, nor are we guaranteed that they were the only enemy forces in this system.”
“Understood, sir,” Davis said to Jackson’s departing back.
****
“Another bust. They’re getting better at hiding.”
“It would appear so.”
“Okay,” Colonel Robert Blake exhaled in one explosive breath. “Report to the rest of the group that grid tango-one-six is clear of any trace of the enemy. Not even as much as an abandoned nesting site or any remnants of a digestive viscid patch.”
“Message sent along with all scan data,” the computer said.
This was the fourth suspected star system that Blake had searched and so far he hadn’t turned up anything. Not even a far ranging patrol or small exploratory construct. He was quickly becoming concerned. Relatively speaking, the section of space they were searching was quite small. There should have been some evidence of the Phage in the outlying systems if they were truly getting close to the core mind.
He slammed his palm into the armrest of his seat and began programming in their next waypoint, not bothering to
tell the computer he was ready to depart the system. There were six more systems to search on his board while the other seventeen ships of his group also searched multiple systems.
The procedure had been pretty straightforward and Blake had had high hopes of an early success. His ship would hop into a system, wait and listen for any evidence of the carrier signal the Phage used to employ their networked consciousness, and then investigate further if it was detected to see if it was the system they were looking for.
After the first two goose eggs he altered his mission profile and began flying down further into the system, taking active scans of planets, moons, or asteroids that would have been of interest to any Phage force passing through or trying to establish a node. When he found no signs the enemy had ever been in any of those systems he began to fear that the Vruahn liaisons had been mistaken when they told him that the core had been detected in this region of space.
“How many hops to the next objective?”
“Three hops will be required in order to maintain prescribed low-observability protocols,” the computer said.
“Proceed.” Blake leaned back and rubbed his eyes. “Stop just before the final hop into the next system and alert me. I’ll be down in the galley.”
“Acknowledged.”
Blake climbed awkwardly out of the low-slung seat and walked stiffly off the flight deck. He had been taking short naps in the pilot’s seat since setting out from New Sierra, fully confident that he’d be the one to quickly locate the target. He’d carefully pored over the intelligence report his ship had received from the Vruahn and intentionally picked his search location based on the higher likelihood of the core mind location. Not only had he not found the target, he’d not even located the slightest bit of evidence the Phage were even in this region of space, while over half his group had been reporting positive contact with enemy combat units before slinking back out of the system after determining the core mind wasn’t there.
The simple logistics of supporting something as vital as the core mind had to be immense, or so Blake assumed. He’d seen the Phage bring in overwhelming force just to protect one of their production facilities, something that could be recreated within a matter of weeks, so he could not conceive of them leaving the most important single construct of their species without enough defensive firepower to handle anyone they’d pissed off within a two hundred lightyear radius. The fact that he was seeing no sign that they were around told him that they’d been given bad information.
As he sat and mechanically chewed on the grayish lump of whatever the food dispenser had spit out, his thoughts greatly disturbed him. For the first time since waking up after going into hibernation on the Carl Sagan he was beginning to have doubts about the Vruahn. Doubts about their honesty and doubts about their true intentions.
He’d observed Jackson Wolfe closely before and after he had gone aboard the cruiser to talk with Setsi. When the starship captain had returned Blake couldn’t help but notice how … off … he was, almost angry, despite having successfully negotiated some measure of aid from the reluctant, near-pacifist species.
The more he idly reflected on Wolfe’s strange, or at least unexpected, reactions, the more he found that what he was really doing was reexamining his own humanity. Where did he fit in? Humans had kept evolving societally for hundreds of years while he and his crew were dead and then later working for the Vruahn. What struck him as especially strange was that he had worked for the better part of a century for the Vruahn, had maintained his own sense of culture and self, but until recently he’d never felt any real desire to return back to his own people. Now that he had been back among large groups of humans and had breathed in the air of Earth he was overcome with an almost uncontrollable need to be back as soon as possible.
With thoughts of what building a life back on Earth could possibly be like once he’d completed this last and easily his most ambitious mission, Colonel Blake trudged back to his quarters. Although exhausted both physically and mentally, sleep did not come easily for him as strange, conflicting visions swam through his consciousness.
Chapter 14
“Position confirmed, sir. We’re just inside the outer boundary of the Zulu System and carrying enough velocity from transition to clear the jump point.”
“Very good,” Jackson said. “Tactical, begin passive scans of the system. OPS, give Tactical a hand … I specifically want you looking for nearby navigational hazards. This system has a lot of large asteroids that fly right through the jump point’s locale.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Coms, you know the drill. Keep watch for the rest of the squadron and keep any communications directional and short range.”
“Yes, sir.” Keller didn’t look up from the terminal he’d configured to watch the aft thermal imagers for the transition flashes of the other destroyers.
“Any Phage signatures in this system?” Jackson pressed his earpiece further in. Why the hell they couldn’t come up with a “universal fit” earpiece that actually fit but could move hundreds of thousands of tons worth of starship across billions of miles faster than light was beyond him.
“Affirmative,” the voice from the Cube said. “Strong contacts in the inner system; preliminary analysis indicates they are the same units encountered in the previous system.”
“Good,” Jackson said quietly. “You’re clear to interface with our main display to provide distance and bearing. No other systems are to be accessed for now.”
“Acknowledged.”
“Captain!”
“As you were, Mr. Barrett,” Jackson said as numbers and targeting brackets began appearing on the main display. “We’ve interfaced the main display with the telemetry output of the Vruahn device in the hold. Nav! You are to assume that the bracketed contacts on the main are enemy ships. I want a course that takes us downhill with the least chance of being seen.”
“Aye, sir.” Accari spun and began punching the numbers into his terminal.
“Tactical, these are most likely the three Alphas that we encountered in the X-Ray System and not of the type we’re hunting,” Jackson said. “We won’t know for certain until we’re able to get a hard confirmation from our own sensors. I want you to give me the optimum range you’ll need to quickly paint them with the active array and still give us enough room to accelerate and attack.”
“Aye, sir,” Barrett said. “This may take me a moment.”
“We’re still far out of range. Take your time and make sure you’re as accurate as possible,” Jackson stood. “OPS, make sure the monitor teams are in place and still keeping a close watch on the Vruahn cargo.”
“Yes, sir.”
“What’s your plan if these are the same three Alphas, Captain?” Davis asked.
“I’m working on that, Lieutenant,” Jackson frowned. “Thankfully we have a bit of time before we have to commit to one strategy or another.”
The rest of the squadron slipped into the system without incident, their next-generation warp drives making a much smaller visible light flash during transition than any other capital ship in the fleet. After a quick message via short-range com laser from the Ares, they all stacked up behind the lead ship to provide a minimal cross-section to any active sensor sweeps and began the slow march down into the inner system.
As the procession moved along at a relative crawl, Jackson ran dozens of scenarios through his head as to what he would do if the ships down in the inner system were just the three basic Alphas they’d already run into. While he’d given a few motivational speeches about not giving up until the mission was complete, there were some stark realities he faced that were cause for serious concern. First and foremost the Starwolf-class starship was a destroyer, not an expedition ship. They just didn’t have the range to fly out much past the Zulu System and make it back in any sort of realistic timetable with the fuel they had on board. High-warp flight chewed through their deuterium reserves, and they were already nibbling into the safety buff
er Jackson liked to keep in reserve when flying a mission with so many unknowns.
The range issue was a bit academic because the space beyond Zulu was largely unexplored. There were no jump points into warp lanes that would take them to the next system that might have Phage ships. So far they were concentrating on systems with planets that were habitable by humans, but there was no indication the Phage needed such specific conditions to survive and thrive. For all he knew they were massing an enormous battle fleet in the next system and they could fly right past it trying to get to another star with Goldilocks planets. So going out past Zulu wasn’t an option, but neither was turning back and making the trip back to the DeLonges System empty-handed.
For the thousandth time since leaving New Sierra he cursed their new allies for providing aid in the form of a veritable puzzle box he was forced to figure out before they could even begin planning an assault on the Phage core mind.
“Steady as she goes, Lieutenant,” he said quietly to Davis. “I’m going down to CIC.”
“CIC?” she asked, her voice betraying her surprise.
“I’ve got less than twenty hours before this mission goes completely sideways,” he almost whispered. “I’m going to go through the sensor logs with the analysts and see if there’s something obvious we’re missing that could get us back on course.”
“Of course, sir.” Her skepticism was evident even though she did an admirable job of maintaining a neutral expression.
****
“Report.”
“According to the Vruahn equipment’s feed the Alphas have drifted into a high orbit over the fourth planet and their velocity has been constant,” Barrett said. “I don’t believe they see us or intend to break orbit and flee, sir.”
“How long until we go active?” Jackson sat down, forcing his clenched hands open.
“Five hours, nine minutes.”
Counterstrike (Black Fleet Trilogy, Book 3) Page 11