The Vaaach charged toward the Krag vessel like an enraged bull, steering a straight course without any evasive maneuvers. It turned only to follow course changes by the Krag, apparently angling to bring its most powerful and least damaged weapons batteries to bear. Within a few minutes, several displays around CIC began to show the Vaaach ship, outlined in the coruscating flashes of Krag pulse cannon bolts detonating against its deflectors, shedding currents of incandescent plasma that flowed and swirled over the ship like an unworldly substance created by the merger of smoke, flame, and St. Elmo’s fire.
As the Vaaach ship closed on the Krag vessel, the pulse cannon hits become more frequent, and the glow became ever brighter. Max hoped earnestly that the young Vaaach’s calculations of his ship’s ability to withstand the Krag weapons fire were accurate, because if the Vaaach ship succumbed, he knew the Cumberland wouldn’t last two minutes against the cruiser’s blistering salvos.
“Mr. Kasparov, be sure to monitor the Vaaach’s aft signal light. Notify us when you see it blink three times,” Max ordered.
“Mr. Nelson, when Mr. Kasparov gives us that notification, engage all stealth modes.
“Weapons, at that same signal, you are to open the missile doors on tubes one and two and verify that both missiles are ready for firing in all respects.”
Once those orders were repeated, there was nothing further to say. Men nervously glanced at the image of the Vaaach ship, the nimbus of plasma from the Krag weapons now a brilliant yellow-white, enclosing the vessel and trailing behind like a scale model of a comet, tiny but impossibly brilliant.
Barely visible in the light show surrounding the Vaaach, a tiny lamp blinked three times. “Sir, it’s the lamp signal,” said Kasparov.
“Very well,” said Max as he saw Nelson put the ship back in stealth mode and Levy open the missile doors, and heard them announce doing so. “In about ten seconds, the Vaaach ship is going to veer off. We will maintain course and speed until I order otherwise.”
A chorus of “Aye, sir” resounded.
As Max predicted, the Vaaach vessel suddenly turned violently to starboard and pitched down, almost as though it were trying to get around to the Krag ship’s flank and/or its belly. The Krag cruiser, surprisingly maneuverable for a vessel of its size and mass, turned to keep up. The bow of the powerful ship was its most heavily armored section and contained its most powerful weapons batteries, strongest deflectors, and most acute sensors; accordingly, the Krag commander wanted that part of his ship pointed at his enemy.
Focusing on the Vaaach vessel, with its most acute sensor arrays pointing in the wrong direction and other arrays damaged in battle with the Union convoy and the Vaaach scout, the Krag failed to detect the heavily stealthed Union vessel now closing from the starboard beam.
“Maneuvering, reduce engines to one-half,” Max said. “Put us on the Krag’s six o’clock. Weapons, target the exhaust aperture.”
“Is there one?” asked Levy.
The business end of a fusion drive is a lot like a rocket engine, except that the exhaust is five times hotter. Which creates a problem. Deflectors work in both directions. A warship’s deflectors not only repel incoming weapons fire if activated while the fusion drive is running, but they also bottle up the plasma exhaust near the ship, incinerating it. Accordingly, when the drive is running, the ship leaves gaps in the rear deflectors to allow the hot gas to escape. In combat conditions, the ship generates—at great energy cost because of the increased distance—an “outer deflector,” a second deflector layer behind the gaps, to prevent an enemy from firing a weapon through the opening. But when a ship is facing only a single opponent that is safely positioned off the bow, many ship captains will not energize the outer deflector, saving the power for other purposes.
“He’s not shielding the aperture,” Kasparov said.
Max smiled. “Outstanding. Maneuvering, keep closing. I intend to fire on this target from just outside the weapons’ minimum range.
“Mr. Levy, set the weapons for simultaneous detonation. Target missile number one for the inside of the port engine bell, and number two for the center.” The Krag ship had three engine “bells,” or exhaust nozzles, arranged in a line from left to right.
“We’ll be at the designated firing range in 15 seconds, Skipper,” Levy said. “Missile in tube one targeted for interior of the Krag port engine bell. Missile in tube two targeted for interior of the center engine bell. Missiles set for simultaneous detonation.”
“Very well.”
Max heard a gasp from Kasparov. He turned to face the Sensor officer. “Phase and polarization modulated tachyo-photon pulse, high power, far above detection threshold. Skipper, it will take five or six more sweeps before they have a firing solution, but they know we’re here.”
“Merde.”
“Sir,” DeCosta said quickly, “that means they’ll energize the outer deflector. It takes several seconds before it’s at full power, but it will be enough to stop a missile almost immediately.”
Max was already coming to his feet. “Maneuvering, ahead Emergency. Make for the center exhaust aperture.
“Weapons, retarget weapon in tube one for the center exhaust bell. Set both tubes for minimum launch velocity. Resynchronize the warheads and set for proximity detonation. Fuse them for twenty meters. And Levy, do the synchronization yourself. Detonation needs to be truly simultaneous. Disengage homing on both weapons—fire on generated bearing.
“Maneuvering, as soon as we fire, I need a hard turn—ninety-degree delta in z.
“Alerts, notify all hands to brace for contact with Krag ship’s outer deflector. My intention, gentlemen, is to break the ship through the outer deflector as it powers up, steer for the center engine bell, and fire into the center engine bell through the exhaust aperture from just outside the warhead blast radius. Since the missile seekers won’t have time to lock on, we will fire from generated bearing only—they’ll just fly straight in and detonate. Any questions?” Like, “Skipper, are you out of your fucking mind?” “None? Very well.”
The impact klaxon sounded. Alerts intoned over 1MC: “Brace for ship impact on enemy deflector. All hands, brace for ship impact on enemy deflector.”
“I’m detecting the outer deflector starting to power up,” Kasparov said. “Impact in four seconds. Three. Two. One.” WHAM!
Even with the inertial compensators at maximum, it felt as though the ship hit a brick wall. It didn’t, of course. Instead, it just underwent rapid deceleration as it passed through an area of polarized tachyo-gravitons exerting force opposite to the direction in which the ship was travelling, penetrating the deflectors by virtue of its mass and heavily armored hull where a more lightly built missile would have been destroyed. Max started to fly out of his seat until he was stopped by his station harness and yanked back into place. He saw several red lights pop up on status panels, but it looked as though most of the lights were still green.
“Damage?” asked Max.
“All Tier One systems available at this time,” reported Tufeld from the Damage Control 1 Station. “Some of the more delicate Tier Three and Four systems are in reset mode due to the shock. I expect most of them to restore in two minutes or less. I’ve routed the list to the CO and XO consoles.”
“Thank you, Tufeld.”
“Firing tubes one and two in three seconds,” Levy said. “Two. One. Firing.”
The instant the missiles left their tubes, the Cumberland pitched “up,” making a 90-degree turn, which, combined with the forward motion of the Krag ship, served to create maximum distance between the Cumberland and the target in minimum time.
At such short range, the missiles’ flight time was 1.7 seconds, not enough time for them to be acquired by any of the Krag point defense systems. Before Levy could announce that they were “hot, straight, and normal,” both weapons lanced into the center engine bell and det
onated. Mr. Levy had done his job well, and the detonations were in fact precisely simultaneous. Because the warheads went off inside the Krag ship’s deflectors and only twenty meters from her hull, the effect of the two 1.5-megaton warheads was truly devastating.
The twin fireballs vaporized nearly 90 percent of the ship, turning the remaining 10 percent into a spray of liquid metal droplets that quickly cooled to form countless hard, spherical metal bullets zipping at high speeds through interstellar space and doomed to never strike a target.
“Maneuvering, lay us alongside the Vaaach ship. Distance 100 kilometers. Mr. Chin, hail the Vaaach.”
“Skipper,” said Chin, “the Vaaach are hailing us.”
“Outstanding. Let’s see it.”
The young Vaaach appeared again and began to speak. His growls and roars, however, sounded subdued. “I have been in contact with the commander for this sector, who instructs me to direct that you remain at this location until he arrives, which will be in approximately one hundred breaths [roughly twelve minutes]. He says that if you leave this location, you will be hunted down and destroyed. May the commander be less angry with you than he was with me. I am ordered to return for repairs now. Farewell, most warlike fruit eater. I hope to hunt with you again. This transmission ends now.”
About eight minutes later, Kasparov announced “Unidentified sensor contact, designated as Uniform Two, bearing three-four-six mark two-five-five, range zero-point-five-two AU. Contact is at constant bearing decreasing range, speed point niner-four. Depending on his decel profile, he’ll be on us in about four minutes. Contact is based on Uniform Two’s active sensor emissions only. No other readings, mass, EM, or otherwise. It’s looking as though they have an incredibly effective stealth suite, and they just decided to turn on an active scan so that we could detect them. If I didn’t know better, I’d say that it was almost like they were giving us a buzz on voicecom before dropping in for a visit. Being polite by letting us know they were coming, if you know what I mean.”
“I know exactly what you mean, Mr. Kasparov, and I think that is exactly what they’re doing. The Vaaach have very strict rules of conduct and honor, and they always follow them.”
Then, to the entire compartment, Max said, “Since we’re dealing with the greatest known hunters and warriors in the galaxy, we need to look the part, people. Weapons, we want them to find us loaded for bear. Reload with Ravens in all three tubes, bring pulse cannon to Prefire.”
Listening to the acknowledgment and implementation of these orders with half an ear, he punched in the voice channel for the Marine detachment.
“Kraft here,” came the answer right away, tinged with just a trace of a Germanic accent.
“Major, this is the skipper. I need you and your six biggest men geared up to do battle with anything on two legs in CIC in about three minutes. Possible?”
Max could almost hear the man smiling. Even for a Marine, Major Kraft’s gung came with an unusually large dose of ho.
“Sir, as the ship is at GQ, all of my men are already geared up to do battle with anything on two legs and just about anything that runs around on four, six, eight, or ten. Do you want us in camo face paint or carrying any particular kind of heavy weapon?”
“The standard M-88s and M-72s will do fine, but I think the face paint is a good touch.”
“On our way.”
“Thank you, Major. Skipper out.” He punched the channel closed.
“Mr. Nelson, confirm that all stealth systems are off-line. Maneuvering, put us on an intercept course for the target.”
As Nelson and LeBlanc were carrying out those orders, DeCosta leaned in Max’s direction. “Sir, I’m not sure I understand those last two orders.”
“Vaaach psychology,” said Max, without a trace of condescension. He knew that what he was doing was anything but obvious. “The Vaaach have detected us, apparently without difficulty. Stealth, trying to hide, looks like cowardice. Understand that the Vaaach divide all animal life into two categories: predators and prey. Then there are different categories of predator, but let’s skip that for now.
“If you don’t want to be treated like prey, you act like a predator. So that’s what we’re doing. We make ourselves plainly detectable and steer an intercept course. In hunting terms, we’re going to step out from behind the bushes and face them like equals, not cower in the underbrush like frightened rabbits. That make sense?”
“Yes, sir. It does. What are the categories of predator?”
“Pertinent question. There are two. The Vaaach are sort of a black and white species, so they tend to divide lots of things into two, and only two, groups. The categories of predator are ‘Hunters with Honor’ and ‘Hunters without Honor.’ Do you know what ‘Vaaach’ means in their language?”
“Sorry, sir, but I never bothered to look it up.”
“Curiosity about things like that might serve you well, XO. You learn lots of interesting things when you take the time to find the answers to the questions your mind generates because some part of your mind has decided that those are the questions that you need to have answered.
“But to the point in question: it’s a compound word made from three parts. ‘Ach,’ meaning ‘hunters’; ‘a’ meaning ‘having,’ ‘possessing,’ or ‘being endowed with’; and ‘va’ meaning ‘honor.’ Of course their syntax is different from Standard. They put the object of the preposition first, so ‘Va-a-ach,’ their own name for their race, means ‘hunters with honor.’ Says a lot about them, don’t you think?”
“Sure does, Skipper. Let’s hope that they honor us by not blowing us to flaming atoms.”
“Amen to that.”
“After reading your report from the last encounter, I always wondered…” DeCosta’s curiosity remained unsatisfied, because at that moment the ship gave a sudden lurch.
“Grap field,” announced Kasparov. “Two-point-three-five million Hawkings.”
“Maneuvering, null the drive. Take maneuvering thrusters to standby and inertial attitude control off-line.” The orders came quickly, but without any evident emotion. “Not even a battleship could make headway against a field that strong. And they’ve probably got the damn thing set on ‘low.’ ”
As soon as LeBlanc acknowledged those orders, Kasparov spoke up. “Sir, it’s déjà vu all over again. Based on visually observed ship configuration and spectrum of the light from her view ports, Uniform Two is posident as Vaaach, same type of ship as our last encounter. Intel has code named that type Boron class. And sir, based on what little trickle of sensor data I’m getting from her, we’re thinking it might be the same ship.”
“Wouldn’t that be an interesting coincidence,” Max said, hoping he sounded a lot calmer than he felt. Several CIC displays showed an image of the Vaaach vessel, a gigantic, black spear point, bristling with technologically advanced means of killing other thinking beings. The warships of most known species looked like nonthreatening elongated boxes or elongated cylinders. But when the Vaaach built a warship, the ship itself looked like a deadly weapon.
Suddenly Chin stirred and started hitting controls. “Sir, we just received comms from the Vaaach ship. And text, sir, not visual. Coming up on Commandcom.”
The butterflies in Max’s stomach turned into a flock of condors. If the Vaaach wanted to talk, they generally waited about a minute and a half and then established visual comms, usually on channel 7. No one ever received text comms from them. At least, no one who lived to file a report.
Max read the text as it came up on the display. “YOU HAVE MADE CLANDESTINE INCURSION INTO VAAACH TERRITORIAL SPACE STOP EXPLAIN QUICKLY WHY WE SHOULD NOT IMMEDIATELY DESTROY YOU STOP MESSAGE ENDS.”
“They certainly do not waste words,” said the doctor.
“Not usually, no,” Max said. The doctor didn’t know the half of it. The message contained none of the formalities of a Vaaach communicati
on between hunters: no greetings, no announcement of the sender’s identity and his credentials as a warrior/hunter, and no ritual insults to the recipient. Just the combined demand and threat. That was bad. Very, very bad. The Vaaach were pissed.
Max needed to send a reply. Now. And without much time to think about it. What to say? Think honor. The Vaaach were all about honor and their Rules of the Hunt. Max spent a few minutes typing on his console, made a few revisions, and then said, “Mr. Chin, send the text that’s on CommandSend.”
“Aye, sir.”
Only after it went out could just about everyone in CIC read: “THIS VESSEL WAS FOLLOWING THE BLOOD TRAIL OF WOUNDED PREY THAT WE DESTROYED JOINTLY WITH VAAACH SCOUT VESSEL STOP ENTRY NOT CLANDESTINE BUT ANNOUNCED BY REPEATED BROADCASTS ON STANDARD INTERSPECIES COMM CHANNELS STOP MESSAGE ENDS.”
“You’re not going to ask them not to kill us?”
“Absolutely not, Doctor. Not unless I have a strong desire to die in the next five seconds. From the Vaaach perspective, any kind of pleading is at least a sign of weakness and, very likely, a sign of guilt. If you are innocent, why plead for mercy rather than simply demonstrating that you’re innocent? What you do in this situation is tell the Vaaach the facts that mean they should not kill you: in this case, first that we were in active pursuit of wounded prey, which under their rules gives us the right to enter their territory; and second, that we didn’t sneak in but announced our presence honorably.”
Major Kraft and his Marines cycled in through the hatch. Having deduced what Max wanted them for, DeCosta arranged them behind the skipper so that if visual communications were established, the Vaaach would see six hardened warriors and their immediate commander arrayed behind their captain, ready to engage in personal combat.
For Honor We Stand (Man of War Book 2) Page 37