“Accelerate to ten gravities. I want you to punch it. Open some distance between you and those aliens,” Thomas said.
“We’re going to hit the Intrepid like missiles if we do that,” Sam protested.
“Leave that to me. We’ll be feeding coordinates over to you shortly,” Thomas said. “Move it. We’re running out of time. Intrepid out.”
Thomas couldn’t do the math for this one. It was beyond him. The course change requirements would have to be precise and perfect, or those fighters would slam into his ship with enough force to blast it to bits. But he could get the Intrepid’s course changed.
“Helm, match their vector and accelerate along the same path. Move away from them,” Thomas said. “As they approach, we’ll roll the ship so we can take them into the bays on both sides.”
“Sir, I can’t possibly match their speed in time. They’re already moving too fast and accelerating.”
“Don’t worry. I’m going to have them slow down before they arrive,” Thomas said.
Then he tapped a few more commands into his computer terminal, putting him in touch with the only being on board who might be able to work out the complex course changes required for all their people to land safely.
Six
Gurgle didn’t have a fighter to command. He’d tried once but hadn’t picked up on the skills required very rapidly. Back on the Hermès, he’d been placed in charge of directing the ship’s automated repair systems. It was a good job. He’d done it very well.
The Intrepid mostly used human crew for repairs, but there were a few automated systems involved. Gurgle was again in charge of those systems. He was to coordinate with the human damage control groups to maximize the efficiency of both human and automated damage control efforts. Until they actually took damage, he didn’t have much to do. Which is why he was surprised to get a call from the Admiral.
“I need a course plotted. It’s complicated, but our pilots are counting on you. Can you do it?” Admiral Stein asked him.
Gurgle surveyed the scan data he’d been sent. He checked the parameters. The first flight was moving too fast. Second flight would do fine, but Harald’s people were coming in too rapidly for a safe landing. If they hit the brakes too soon they’d be torn apart by enemy fighters, though. It was a complex problem, but he thought he could spot a way to save at least most of the Ghosts.
“Gurgle understand. Gurgle fix,” he replied.
He set about working the problem, borrowing most of the CPU cycles from the Intrepid’s central computer to reach a solution as rapidly as possible. The ship’s computer and he had reached an understanding. It recognized in him a similar program, and he’d asserted his authority over it well enough that it obeyed him when he asked for more computing speed.
“Have solution. Need helm control,” Gurgle said, twenty-seven seconds later.
“That was fast. You need our helm? The fighters’ control?” Thomas asked.
“Both,” Gurgle said.
There was a pause. He wondered if the Admiral was going to give him control of the ship or not. It wouldn’t be the first time a human didn’t want to trust him with something important. Gurgle was used to that. It wouldn’t be good for Sam, though. Or Harald. Harald said Gurgle was his friend.
Gurgle didn’t have a lot of friends. He was loath to watch any of them blown to bits. Even in Valhalla that was never a good thing, and in this place it was even worse. Gurgle sent commands to the Intrepid’s computer. If he was denied control, the ship might be convinced to hand it over to him anyway.
“Understood. Passing you helm control for the Intrepid and all fighters,” Thomas said. “Good luck.”
“Gurgle thanks you,” he said.
He didn’t need luck for this, though. The same algorithms that made him excellent at carving and fixing things in Valhalla proved to be strong in this world’s math. He didn’t know why, but it didn’t really matter. Saving his friends was the critical thing.
Gurgle fed the routing information into the Intrepid’s computer, which then transmitted it out to the fighters. They maintained their present speed and heading. He turned the Intrepid sideways. The Admiral’s idea of rolling the ship was a good one. But he hadn’t thought of the best way to get the fighters in fastest.
Alien beam weapons flashed by the ship. If the guns hit a bay, he might lose fighters. No telling which ones wouldn’t have a place to land, so it was better if the beams hit other areas. Gurgle timed the rolls to the enemy rate of fire. A beam slammed into the top of the Intrepid, ripping away armored plating. A few seconds later another beam shattered the armor on the ship’s belly. But no beams struck her on the sides where the vulnerable hangar bays were placed.
Sam’s flight came home first, landing in the bays they’d just left a few minutes before. That was the relatively easy part. Harald’s flight was more challenging.
Gurgle kept them rocketing toward the Intrepid until almost the last moment. Then at precisely the right second, he had Harald’s fighters flip over so that their thrusters were aimed at the Intrepid. Their engines lit up again, burning with brilliant intensity. The maximum thrust from those fighters was incredible, and Gurgle pushed them to the edge of their theoretical stress tolerance, well past the safe zone.
He didn’t flip the fighters back around to land them. That would be the standard way to land a fighter, but there wasn’t time. One after another, they shot into the Intrepid’s bays - backward, the engines cutting off just a few hundred meters away from the ship. The fighters were still moving at a decent pace when they impacted the decks.
Gurgle checked video cameras in the hangar bays. Fighters squealed along deck plates, throwing showers of sparks everywhere. One crashed into the far wall and crumpled like a wadded up ball of paper. Another caught fire. Human attendants rushed forward to put the flames out before they spread.
The last Wasp came in just as the enemy fighters were drawing into weapon range. Beams shot out from the noses of a hundred tiny ships. The Intrepid shook under multiple impacts. Alone, each of the small enemy ships wasn’t a significant threat. But collectively that many could do enormous damage. Gurgle hoped the Admiral would be able to get them away before the damage level went up too high.
“All pilots are in, Admiral,” Gurgle sent. He released control of the ship back to the humans flying it. That had been fun, though. Gurgle tracked down the subroutines that would allow him back into the system again if he wanted to control the Intrepid. The ship’s computer resisted for a few moments, but since he was already within its data structures, it rapidly recognized him as a legitimate program and accepted his demands for access.
This was good. Protecting Sam and her friends was Gurgle’s primary goal. Anything which helped him fulfill that task was good. Anything which blocked his way was bad.
“Well done, Gurgle!” Stein said. “All right, we’re out of here.”
Gurgle wondered briefly what the Admiral would say if he knew his control of the Intrepid had just been compromised. His analysis of interactions over the past months indicated it would not be met with approval, so he decided to keep the information to himself. If the Admiral disapproved, he might take measures to prevent Gurgle from getting back into the ship’s control systems. While he didn’t think it likely he would need to take over the vessel without consent, it wasn’t impossible to imagine a time where Sam’s life might be at risk and he needed to act more rapidly than permission would be granted.
Better to have the power and not use it, than to need it and not have it.
Gurgle felt the ship’s energy surge, the power coursing through internal conduits as the vessel jumped clear of the deadly ambush.
Seven
Sam didn't know precisely how awful the situation had gotten. She knew it was bad enough, though. A quick glance at her external cameras told her that much. The fighter next to her had landed poorly, smashing one wing against the deck and crumpling its nose against the far wall of the hangar bay. The
one beyond that was even worse. That fighter hadn't survived the landing at all, leaving a blazing fireball what once one of their pilots had been.
Her Wasp was peppered with small bits of damage, the results of fragments from the explosion. But it could have been worse. At least it could still fly. Many of the others were in much worse shape.
“CIC, I need to sit-rep. What the hell is going on?” Sam asked over the radio channel.
“Stand by,” came the response.
It wasn’t a voice Sam recognized, nor was it an answer she was happy with. But the fact that some unknown person was answering the radio meant that things had to be pretty hairy up there. Sam sucked back the harsh words she was about to reply with and steeled her voice into a polite tone.
“Understood,” Sam said. “Put me in contact with the Admiral as soon as you’re able.”
“Will do, ma’am,” he replied.
Well, that was frustrating. She’d just have to try and figure out what was going on by herself. Sitting in her fighter wasn’t the best place to do that. It was time to move. With a thought, Sam transferred her consciousness to the shared virtual reality the Ghost pilots lived in on board the Intrepid. There were a lot fewer pilots in the ready room when she arrived than there ought to be. Sam saw most of her own flight, and more were entering as she watched. But Harald’s flight was woefully underrepresented. Sam knew his group would’ve had the worst of the casualties. They were launched first and had gotten back to the ship last. Frankly, she wasn’t sure how any of them had managed to dock at all. Not in the time they had. It was a miracle.
Then Harald appeared, flashing into view. He looked worn, but he was still alive! Sam’s virtual body sagged with relief, then she drew herself up straight and strode toward him. When she hadn’t seen him upon arrival, she feared the worst. If anyone had stayed behind to assure the rest of the pilots make it back safely, Harald would have been the one. She was just glad her friend was still with her!
“Harald. Thank god you made it in! How bad is it?” Sam asked.
“Bad enough. I lost a quarter of my pilots outright, and a few of the other fighters are good for nothing but scrap. None of us are combat operational,” Harald said.
“Damn,” Sam said. So much damage in just the first skirmish and they hadn't even touched the enemy. Sam tried to think of the lives lost, but all she could consider was how totally screwed they were. The aliens were back, with even more forces than before. This was precisely the situation they'd been hoping to avoid.
“They have an active gate. What the hell are we supposed to do now?” Sam asked.
“You’re asking me? I’m a tactician. You're supposed to be the strategist here," Harald said. He gave a grim chuckle “Honestly, I think we do our best and die trying. I don’t see a way to win this one. Not against these odds. Not with them able to bring in more reinforcements anytime they want.”
He wasn’t wrong. With that gate active, the aliens could bring in more ships. As many as they wanted. As many as it took to finally win. With enough effort, ships, guns, and a lot of luck, Earth could beat off even the massive force they’d already seen come through. But that wasn’t worth anything if the enemy could continue bringing in more vessels at will.
Above all else, they had to find a way to shut down that gate. And this time, they needed to stop the enemy from opening another one. Sure, they could come again. But at least Earth would have time to recover, rebuild, and get more ships into space. Maybe Stein what have some ideas about how best to proceed. Sam hoped so, anyway.
A beep alerted Sam to an incoming message.
“Admiral Stein would like to see you in his ready room ASAP,” the message read. Sam heaved a sigh. This time it was Captain Edwards sending the messages. A familiar name had to be a good sign, right?
“Inform the admiral we’ll be there directly,” Sam replied.
She sent the reply and then severed the connection. The invitation was only for her, but she had every intention of bringing Harald as well. He was second in command of the Ghosts and needed to be in the loop about what was going on as much as she did.
“The Admiral wants to see us,” Sam said.
“Us?” Harald asked. Clearly, he assumed the invitation was for her alone. He wasn’t wrong, but Sam didn’t have to let him know that.
“Us,” Sam confirmed. “Meet me there.”
Sam’s avatar blinked as she gave the mental command to transition her consciousness into the ready room computers. She wasn’t sure why; the transition was instantaneous and required nothing more than her thought command. It annoyed Sam that she’d picked up foible somehow. Leftovers from having once been in a physical body? She thought maybe that was it. How much of that old self was still there? How many of those habits were helpful? How many were harmful?
All things to worry about later. Looking out from a computer monitor had been disconcerting at first. Sam couldn’t move. She couldn’t pan her vision around the room. The same familiar dread of being confined that she felt the first time resurfaced for a moment, but she pushed it aside. That doing so still took an effort after all these months made her wonder again about those vestigial human quirks.
Admiral Stein, the CAC, and his executive officer were already seated at the table. Sam observed them through a camera mounted above her computer monitor. They could in turn see a picture of her avatar’s face displayed on a small screen. Harald’s visage appeared on the screen opposite hers a few seconds after Sam arrived.
“Good, you're both here. We have a lot to discuss, and not a lot of time to do it in,” Stein said.
Eight
No kidding, Sam thought to herself. Not only had they turned tail and run from the first engagement with this new force, but the Intrepid was hit pretty badly, too. A good chunk of their fighter force was out of commission as well. It wasn’t just trouble. This was a disaster.
“I’m hoping you both have some good ideas about what we can do next,” Stein said. He paused, looking at Sam and Harald’s screens each in turn. “Any ideas would be good right about now.”
The CAG - the admiral’s wife, Keladry Stein, Sam recalled - glanced over at him. “Transitioning out of jump in about a minute, Thom.”
“Right, thanks,” Stein said.
“Where are we headed, sir?” Sam asked.
“Earth. Far enough out that we won’t ding the planet with our exit burst, but close enough that we can fly in for resupply. We need to get this ship fit and back out there as rapidly as possible,” Stein replied.
“Makes sense. We bringing in more pilots?” Harald asked.
“Replacements for our losses, yes,” Stein said. “I’m sorry. We tried everything we could to bring all of you back in safely. Gurgle ran the calculations, or the results would have been worse.”
“Gurgle, huh?” Harald said. “I need to thank the little rat. But honestly, Admiral, you could have left us out there. We could have covered the Intrepid’s exit, prevented any damage to the ship.”
“At the loss of even more pilots? No. I don’t throw away my crews’ lives if I can avoid it,” Stein said.
“We’re Ghosts, sir. It’s why we’re here. Every one of my warriors is prepared to die in battle,” Harald said.
Sam wanted to interject that she didn’t share Harald’s opinions on the subject, but she thought it better to hear the admiral’s reply first. How better to take a measure of a man than to see what he said under such circumstances?
“I respect that. The day may come when I ask all of you - all of us - to give that sort of sacrifice, and I appreciate its value. But not if it can be avoided,” Stein replied.
Sam’s avatar let out a little breath, like a sigh. Good to see. Stein was willing to treat all her people like they were actual people. She didn’t think every human might feel the same way, but Stein was exceptional in more than one way. It was a good thing he remained in command of the Intrepid.
“We need to see how big a force we’re facing,
sir,” Sam said. “We only saw the first ships after they came through the gate. If there’s more, we need to know about it.”
“Not a problem. Every major telescope on Earth and above it will be trained on that spot in space by now. We’ll be able to get good updates, if a little delayed,” the CAG said.
“Ma’am, what’s the light lag from that position?” Sam asked. She was getting used to the idea of flitting about in space. Light lag had created a delay in communications between her scouting group. It meant there would be a lag in spotting any changes to the enemy fleet as well. How long light took to reach Earth from that spot might make a huge difference.
“About six hours,” Keladry replied.
“And the transition through jump from there to here?” Sam asked.
“It’s taking us twenty minutes. But we’re not sure about their drives, it might be longer or shorter - oh!” Keladry nodded. “I see where you’re going with this. We won’t have long to react if they vanish before they appear somewhere else.”
“We won’t have any time at all,” Sam said. “They’ll be coming at us faster than the light of their departure.”
They weren’t actually going faster than light, of course. The Alcubierre drive bent space in front and behind the ship, allowing a ship to warp its way to a destination. How much power they could pour into the drive determined how much fold there was, which in turn resulted in the effective ‘speed.’
How many of their ships could jump? That was the burning question of the day. They were pretty sure the bigger vessels couldn’t, but that wouldn’t stop the aliens from bringing a bunch of smaller, jump-capable ships through the gate.
“I’ll alert Mars and Venus colonies as soon as we exit the jump,” Stein said. “We’ll want every ship on the watch.”
Sam had a feeling they might already be too late. She checked the time. The aliens had the advantage of speed, and they’d caught the human forces off-guard. If they weren’t fools, they’d know they needed to press the edge quickly.
Ghost Squadron Page 3