by D. J. Holmes
Lightfoot grimaced. Ordinarily the opportunity to see a Chinese fleet maneuvering would provide priceless intel. Yet, ideally, he would like to get the information while lying in stealth, not while escorting a convoy that would be lighting up every sensor within a light day. Britain and China might be at peace but being out in the open so far from home made him feel a little nervous. Not to mention the battleship. The Chinese only had one of the mammoth ships in their fleet. What was it doing out here?
“Tactical orientate our optical and heat sensors towards these new comers. Let’s see what our Chinese friends are doing with themselves out here in the back end of nowhere.”
It would take over fifty minutes for the heat and optical data to travel from the Chinese fleet to Surprise, twenty more than it would take to reach the convoy. Yet getting so much information back to the Admiralty and the Royal Space Navy Intelligence would be priceless.
*
Aboard the Chinese medium cruiser Yang Wei Captain Zu was just receiving a communication stream from his admiral. “Captain, you know the importance of our mission and the importance of secrecy. Those British ships cannot be allowed back to Earth. You command our fastest ship, I’m detaching the Yang Wei and her sister ship the Chao Yung. I want you and Captain Kuang to destroy that convoy. Don’t leave a single ship alive. I know you didn’t sign up for these kinds of missions but it is essential that the British do not learn our fleet was here. No word can be allowed to get back to Earth. I’m going to jump on to our next destination once we have charged our jump drives. You are to follow once you have finished here. Understood?”
“Yes sir, they will all be turned into space debris.”
The Admiral smiled as he clicked off the communication. He had handpicked his Captains for this mission because he knew they would follow him no matter what. He had just ordered his subordinate to fire on friendly naval vessels and unarmored freighters and he hadn’t even blinked! Fifty years ago such an order would have been unthinkable but the British were about to find out that things had changed in China. He knew the ultimate responsibility would fall on him for what was about to happen but he did not care. That, he suspected, was why he had been chosen for this mission. His superiors knew he would do whatever it took to ensure China acquired the four habitable worlds they had discovered.
*
“Sir,” Sub Lieutenant Erickson said with alarm from his tactical station aboard Surprise, “two of the Chinese ships have gone to full acceleration. They are heading straight for the convoy.”
Ordinarily ships could only be detected by the radiation they vented into space. They, therefore, did everything they could to prevent any radiation escaping but when it came to heat radiation it was almost impossible. With fusion reactors and impulse drives operating at even sixty percent a ship lit up in the cold dark expanse of space like a firework in the night’s sky back on Earth.
However, as radiation only travels at the speed of light, ships were effectively limited to looking into the past. Over short distances this didn’t cause a problem but for anything over a light minute away it meant that a Commander was always reacting to what his opponent had done in the past.
The only exception is when a ship wants to use anything close to its full acceleration. The impulse drives human vessels use for traveling through normal space produce huge levels of acceleration. Yet, in doing so, they create gravimetric disturbances that could be picked up instantaneously over long distances.
Cursing, Lightfoot brought up the feed from the gravimetric sensors on his own console. Erickson was right; the Chinese were heading straight for the convoy. He transferred the data to the main holo-display and let the computer crunch the numbers.
Lightfoot swore even louder. The convoy had been slowly heading into the mass shadow of the Damang system as they waited for Surprise to locate the stray freighter. A system’s mass shadow was the area of space where the combined mass of the system’s star and planets produced enough of a gravimetric disturbance to prevent ships using their shift drives. The Chinese had come out of shift space right on the edge of the mass shadow; almost exactly at the same position the convoy had entered the system. Even if the freighters went full burn on their drives they couldn’t reach a safe place to enter shift space before the Chinese ships got within missile range. Knowing Captain Turner he guessed what was about to happen next.
“Sir,” Erickson called excitedly, “Resolution and Renown have gone to full military acceleration, they are heading straight for the two Chinese vessels.”
Nodding, Lightfoot had to push down the urge to rebuke Erickson for his enthusiasm. The boy really needs to grow up, he thought to himself. Battle was never a thing to get excited about!
Instead he asked, “and what are our charges doing?”
“They are beginning to accelerate now, wait, from their acceleration patterns it looks like they are scattering. Some are going for the mass shadow, others are diving into the system,” Erickson answered.
“Have you been able to identify the two Chinese ships?”
“The computer has a positive match now. Their acceleration rates are higher than anything we have ever seen from a Chinese ship before. They must be the new Yang Wei class. Only three have left the construction yards according to intelligence. One of them is bound to be the Yang Wei herself. ”
Lightfoot ran the numbers in his head. Resolution and Renown could only put out a combined salvo of nine missiles. RNI estimated that the British missiles had better ECM capabilities than the Chinese but that wouldn’t make up for the disparity in numbers. The Chinese medium cruisers had thicker armor than Resolution, and combined, had a throw weight of twenty-two missiles.
Turner was no fool. He must know the odds too. Lightfoot guessed he was hopping that Renown’s armament would cause enough of a surprise to allow Resolution to get in close. All human warships were equipped with plasma cannons. Short ranged weapons, they shot out super-heated plasma bolts that could shred even valstronium armor. If Resolution could get into plasma range she could cripple both Chinese cruisers with a single salvo allowing the rest of the convoy to escape. Resolution would never survive the return fire but she would go down fighting.
Turning to First Lieutenant Cromwell, Lightfoot sought his opinion, “what do you make of all this?”
“Well sir,” he began, “it seems the Chinese don’t want us in this system, or at least they didn’t want us seeing that fleet of theirs. We’re too far away to come to Resolution’s aid but if those two ships blow through Resolution and Renown they’ll be coming straight for us. I’m sure they will have picked up our gravimetric signature too.”
Lightfoot nodded solemnly. “Agreed. Unless there has been a declaration of war since we left Earth those ships don’t want us reporting back what we’ve seen. There’s no good reason for them to have a fleet all the way out here, even if we are at war. We can’t help Resolution so we’re going to have to think only of ourselves, as hard as that is. Getting this information back to the Admiralty could be more important than all the ships in our little convoy. Given how far into the system’s mass shadow we are I don’t think they’re going to let us get to use our jump drive, I do have a few ideas though.”
Cromwell leaned in closer to his Commander to hear him outline his plan.
*
Aboard the Yang Wei, Zu was struggling to contain his anticipation. Both of the British warships were coming right for him. It would allow him to quickly dispatch them before the freighters and the other frigate could make their escape. “Hold fire until we enter optimal missile range,” he commanded.
Zu knew the British had a slight advantage in missile range but he was gambling they would not want to fire the first shot. There was no way his opponents could know what their fleet was doing out here and as there had been no declaration of war there was no reason for the British ships to risk a diplomatic incident by opening fire first. That said, it was obvious the two British combat ships knew their business
. They were putting themselves right between his two cruisers and the freighters they had been escorting.
Speaking to his bridge crew Zu began to bark out orders. “Contact the Chao Yung, I want them to prepare to fire on my mark. Spread the missiles between both ships.”
Zu watched the range gradually drop. “Prepare to fire….Fire, missiles away.”
As shouted the command to fire, Zu found himself sitting at the edge of his command chair. It would take over five minutes for the gunners to reload the missile tubes but he hoped that their first salvo would be enough to obliterate the British ships. With both pairs of ships accelerating towards each other it would only take another fifteen minutes for them to enter plasma cannon range. He smiled, he knew both British vessels would be space dust before then.
“Impact in sixty seconds,” his weapons officer announced. “They still haven’t opened fire.”
Dismissing his concern Zu leaned closer to the holo-display. At forty seconds out both British ships began to fire off counter missiles.
Zu frowned. The frigate was putting out more than twice the amount of counter missiles intelligence said its class could. His twenty-two missiles had been reduced to ten. Then, in disbelief, Zu watched as the missiles entered the range of the close point defense batteries and all but one of his missiles disappeared off the gravimetric sensor screen before they reached their targets. The final missile detonated close to the British light cruiser but its gravimetric signal continued on strong.
After a string of Chinese curse words Zu brought up the imagery of the battle. The two pairs of ships were so close now that he could almost watch the British counter missiles fire in real time. When the missiles were twenty seconds out, space around the both British ships lit up as they fired off their point defense plasma cannons. Zu’s frown deepened. Along with the bursts from the plasma cannons there were other explosions. They looked like, like, flak explosions he had seen from 20th century war films. Quickly Zu zoomed in on the frigate and let out a final curse. The frigate only had a single missile tube down its flank. Instead of the customary second one it had two large railguns mounted fore and aft.
“A flak ship,” he shouted. “That frigate is a dedicated flak ship! They are firing some kind of exploding shell! Order the next salvo to be targeted on the frigate and fire immediately.” Flak ships hadn’t been used in hundreds of years of warfare, not since wet navies had duked it out with airplanes back on Earth. It had been deemed that space was just too big and the velocities involved just too great for exploding flak rounds to actually hit an incoming missile. The British had obviously found a way to bring the concept into space warfare and they had managed to keep it a secret too!
Looking down Zu saw that they were just waiting for number three tube to report target locked. Moments later Yang Wei Zu shuddered as she fired her second salvo at the British.
Almost as soon as the twenty-two Chinese missiles appeared on the gravimetric plot nine more appeared from the two British ships as they eventually returned fire.
Zu almost didn’t notice as he was checking the distances between the two pairs of closing ships. He would have time for one more salvo before they entered plasma range. “Navigation, reduce us to ten percent thrust, we can’t let them use their plasma cannons.”
Reducing their closing speed would give him time for another salvo before the British would get too close. With luck one extra salvo would do it. Zhu sat back and watched his missiles approach the enemy ships. He left defending his own to his subordinates. A Yang Wei class cruiser was designed to defend itself against incoming salvos of ten missiles; his two cruisers should handle the British missiles easily.
One by one his missiles began to drop off the plot as British counter missiles intercepted them. Twelve made it through into close point defense range. Again they began to explode quicker than should have been possible yet not quickly enough. The frigate didn’t seem to be doing as good a job of destroying the missiles when they were headed straight for it.
Two made it through and as they both dropped off the plot showing they had exploded, the British frigate dropped off as well. Looking quickly over to the visual sensors Zu was able to see both missiles penetrate the frigate before they turned it into an expanding ball of particles.
Zu’s smile was immediately replaced with a startled snarl as the bridge shook violently. “What was that?” he demanded.
His first officer, who was responsible for the point defense, replied in a concerned tone. “The British must have had a dedicated ECM missile in that salvo. Just before we began to fire counter missiles it activated and suddenly our sensors thought we were facing fifteen missiles rather than nine. The targeting computer didn’t have time to distinguish between them so it targeted them all. One got through and got a proximity hit.”
“Damage report?” Zu snapped.
Again the first officer had to speak up as no one else wanted to take responsibility. “We have lost some sensor blisters on our port side along with one missile tube and a counter missile emplacement. Engineering is reporting a fluctuation in engine number three; they have had to shut it down for now. Everything is at full functionality.”
“We’ll soon have our revenge. Target the light cruiser and fire our next salvo when ready.” Zu growled in anger.
Just then the gravimetric plot beeped to announce new contacts. Zu had to blink to make sure what he was seeing was real. The British had fired another salvo, only three minutes after their first.
“Weapons, what’s going on?” Zu demanded.
“Sir, I’m not sure. Wait, we’re getting active radar seekers from all nine missiles. I think they have gone into a rapid-fire mode. At this close range they aren’t trying to upload targeting data from their ship’s sensors. They are just pointing and firing them, letting the missiles lock on to us themselves.”
Cursing Zu finally realized what the British had intended all along. They had never thought that they could make it to plasma cannon range. They had banked on their flak frigate getting them close enough to shift to their rapid-fire mode. One or both of his cruisers was about to take a hammering.
Zu watched dispassionately as the British missiles zeroed in on his sister ship. Chao Yung managed to get off another coordinated salvo before the British missiles reached her. Again they seemed to magically multiply on the sensors just before they entered counter missile range. All but two were destroyed however both proved to be real missiles not ECM illusions.
Neither managed to directly hit the Chao Yung but both got proximity detonations. The blast waves washed over her and she visibly shook on the holo-display as Zu watched. Moments later damage reports came across from the other ship. She had lost most of her external sensor nodes and sixty percent of her point defense capability. Her stabilizing thrusters were in disarray and Zu watched as she began to roll slowly.
His weapons officer brought his mind back to the fight. “Sir, our missile salvo is about to enter counter missile range.”
Zu looked back to the main holo-display showing the progress of his missiles. There was no sign of any counter missile fire. Then the plot erupted with eight more contacts. The British had managed to get off another salvo!
Just as he released a sigh of relief when he saw the missiles were going for Chao Yung and not his ship, the British light cruiser erupted into a fireball. In delaying their counter missile fire to fire their own salvo of anti-ship missiles they had sealed their fate. The light cruiser had only knocked out seven missiles before the rest of his third salvo vaporized it. Yet she would have the last say in this engagement. Reluctantly Zu forced himself to watch as eight missiles closed in on the damaged Chao Yung.
*
Back on board Surprise there was a groan as first one and then both of the gravimetric readings from Resolution and Renown dropped off the plot. There was a muted cheer when one of the Chinese medium cruisers quickly followed but as the final cruiser re-orientated itself towards Surprise all eyes turned
towards Lightfoot.
“You all know my plan by now. We can’t hope to stand up to a single medium cruiser even if she took some damage from Resolution. Cromwell, signal the freighter and tell them we are going ahead with the plan.
As Lightfoot turned back to the main holo-display he watched as one by one the other freighters that had been with Resolution dropped off the plot, a clear sign that missiles from the Chinese cruiser had caught each of them.
On cue the remaining freighter, the one they had been sent to find, dumped all its cargo and went to full burn on its engines. They were heading towards the mass shadow at an angle that would give them the best chance of escaping into shift space. The plot on the holo-display updated to show that the Chinese cruiser would still catch the freighter before she could make her jump. Yet there would only be minutes to spare. Clearly the cruiser had taken some damage in the skirmish with Resolution as she was only producing ninety percent of the acceleration she had before.