Brothers in Valor (Man of War Book 3)

by H. Paul Honsinger

  “Definitely. That’s a scrap I’d pay cash to see.” Max paused as a smirk wrote itself across his face. “I bet there’s some kickin’ and a gougin’ in the mud and the blood and the beer.”

  “Beer, sir?”

  “Yes, XO, beer. Check out the section in Commander Kim’s Biosum on his nickname, and you’ll get it.”

  “If you say so, sir.”

  As the Krag convoy approached, Max got his ship and its complement ready for the encounter. Each man was given an opportunity to go to the mess or Wardroom, as appropriate, for a hot meal. Max had the weapons crews pull the Talon missiles in tubes one and two, as well as the Egg Scrambler in tube three, check all their systems, and reload them. He also had engineering crews recheck the launch coils in all three tubes and every step in the chain of systems used to fire the pulse-cannons.

  During this process something kept nagging at him. Finally Max put his finger on it. “Mr. Bartoli, back when you gave me your first type and formation report on the Krag convoy, you said that you were trying to figure something out but weren’t having any luck. Would you kindly fill me in on what you were trying to figure out and whether you have had any luck doing so?”

  “Well, sir,” said Bartoli, “I’m ashamed to admit that I keep coming up with a minor mass discrepancy on the tanker. No matter what estimation technique I use, the tanker we’ve got has a lower mass than calculations predict.”

  This made Max and DeCosta both sit bolt upright. Neither liked surprises. “How much lower?” DeCosta managed to say before Max could.

  “Somewhere between 5 and 10 percent, depending on the predictive model I use, my estimates for the amount of fuel the tanker has in its own propellant tanks, stores in its hold, et cetera, and how heavy their deuterium is.”

  “How heavy?” DeCosta asked. “I thought all deuterium was the same density.”

  “It is, XO,” said Max. “If we’re talking about pure deuterium—or all deuterium of the same purity. You know from your greenie days that deuterium is denser than standard hydrogen and that our deuterium is standardized at 95.4 percent deuterium, 1.2 percent tritium, and 3.4 percent regular hydrogen and impurities. Our fusion reactors won’t run, or at least not run very well, on anything lower than 94 percent or so; therefore, we refine to 95+ percent in order to have a bit of a safety margin in case one batch comes in low for whatever reason. Of course, the richer the mixture, the more efficiently the reactors run, so higher is better. The Krag reactors are a bit more impurity-tolerant, which I translate as technologically advanced, than ours. They run fine on a mix as low as 90 percent deuterium or so. And because richer is better, any given batch of fuel will run somewhere between 91 percent and 98 percent, so there are variations in the density of their fuel.”

  Max turned back to Bartoli. “And there’s no hypothesis you can come up with that explains this difference?”

  “None.”

  “What if they’re not fully loaded?”

  “Skipper, our probes have given us good visuals of the tanker from all sides, and there’s a full-size tank in every bracket.”

  “Then she must be hauling some empty tanks.”

  “Sir, there is no report of any fleet tanker on an outbound run ever carrying any empty tanks.”

  Max looked at Ensign Bhattacharyya at Intel for confirmation. “Affirmative, sir. Bartoli asked me to double-check his research on that subject. I have, and it is confirmed. Over the course of the war, there have been 338 observations of Krag fleet tankers where there is good data on the tank loadout and the ship’s overall mass. On none of those occasions is there sufficient mismatch between the number of tanks and the mass to suggest that any of the tanks was empty.”

  “On top of that, sir,” Bartoli added, “if I put in the mass data for an empty tank, I come up light. If I had to guess, one of the tanks is filled with something other than deuterium.”

  “Well, then,” said Max, “that’s got to be it. Maybe they’ve hollowed out one tank and used it for passenger transport space or to haul bulk cargo or spare parts. Three hundred and thirty-eight observations of the hundreds of thousands of tanker runs that have had to have taken place over the course of the war is hardly a sample size I’d want to draw any serious conclusions from. They’ve got to have something in that tank other than deuterium—that’s got to be it.”

  “Yes, sir,” Bartoli said. “That’s got to be it.”

  Somehow, neither felt entirely reassured.

  ▪

  “Casualty Station, Nurse Church here.” Church’s gravelly voice came from the transducer on Max’s console. As Max was about to start speaking, he heard another voice in the background that he instantly recognized as that of Dr. Sahin.

  “Nurse,” Sahin said, with definite shrillness, “if you are not too busy, Able Spacer Second Class Hoffman, his torn medial collateral ligament, and not the least of all, I, would be eternally grateful if you would return to the procedures table. And on your way, would you do me the favor of shooing that infernal cat into the next compartment. You know regulations explicitly prohibit the presence of the ship’s cat within 1.5 meters of any sterile field.”

  Max knew that Church could see on the source identification display above the transducer indicating that the call was from CIC and could almost hear him shrugging helplessly. Max decided to rescue him. “Doctor, this is the skipper.”

  “I have already recognized your voice, sir.” The doctor’s voice leaped into the auditory foreground as the computer automatically activated an audio pickup over the procedures table. “Is there anything I can do for you that doesn’t interfere too meaningfully with my efforts to repair a serious knee injury incurred by a spacer who doesn’t have enough sense to get out of the way when a loudly beeping forklift in the cargo hold is backing toward him?”

  “Sorry, Bones,” the man could be heard to murmur in the background. “Had my head up my ass.”

  “Indeed you did, Spacer,” said the doctor. “Now stop speaking and lie still. We’ll be done in a few minutes.”

  “Not a thing, Doctor,” said Max. “I merely wanted to advise you that our attack on the convoy is about to begin. You usually like to be in CIC when such things transpire.”

  “And I’m sorry to have to eschew an opportunity to view yet more Krag being destroyed yet one more time by you and yet more thermonuclear explosions, but I don’t think that doing so would be fair to young Hoffman here as I repair yet another of his injuries sustained yet again due to his inattention to his surroundings. One of these days, young man, you’re going to break something that I cannot fix, and our skipper here is going to have to send an I’m sorry for your loss commgram to your gray-haired grandmother on Ben-Shieber V.”

  “I concur wholeheartedly, Doctor,” Max said, leaving open whether he concurred with Bram’s decision to stay with his patient or with his admonition to Hoffman. “Give my regards to your patient. Thank you, Nurse Church. CIC out.” He closed the circuit.

  Max looked around CIC and noticed the men smiling at Sahin’s comments. Once again he wondered whether the comic relief Bram provided was incidental or intentional or some combination of both. “Now that we’ve settled that weighty issue, XO, status?”

  “Sir, we are keeping station with the convoy on her left flank at a distance of 25,818 kilometers—rate of advance 0.24 c, heading three-two-eight mark one-zero-one. We are fully stealthed, and there is no sign of detection. All stations report manned and ready at Condition Yellow. Weapons loadout: Talon in tube one, Talon in tube two. Drives on both weapons are enabled, warheads armed, safeties disengaged, tubes energized, outer doors are closed. Both weapons are targeted on the VIP transport. Tube three is loaded with a Talon as well and is ready for firing in all respects, save that the outer door is closed. That weapon is not targeted at this time. All three warheads are set for maximum yield. All systems report as nominal. The crew has been fed, and all of the junior mids have been told to go take a leak.”

  “Serious
ly, XO? Someone made them go?”

  “Absolutely, Skipper. Chief Tanaka and I discussed it after the last attack and agreed that it would be a good idea before we went into combat. It wouldn’t do for someone to make a puddle in the middle of an engagement.”

  “I suppose not. All right, then,” Max said. “The weapons are ready, the ship is locked down, and the hatch hangers have all piddled. I suppose that now we can do battle with the evil rodents intent on the extermination of the human race. Mr. Tufeld, set Condition Red throughout the ship.”

  “Aye, sir. Condition Red.” Tufeld keyed the Klaxon and opened MC1. His arresting voice filled the ship. “General Quarters, General Quarters. Set Condition Red throughout the ship. Close all airtight doors and secure all pressure bulkheads. All hands to action stations: ship versus ship.”

  Less than a minute later, a time consumed mainly by fulfilling the requirement that he get confirmations of the “secure” lights from every action station, Tufeld announced, “All decks and stations report secure at Condition Red. All hands at action stations.”

  “Very well, Tufeld,” Max said. “Mr. LeBlanc, let’s execute our closure maneuver.”

  “Closure maneuver, aye.” LeBlanc had his men carry out the maneuver planned by Max, DeCosta, and Bartoli to bring the Cumberland into position to attack the convoy. For once, it was nothing particularly tricky or elaborate, given the poor sensor suites on the convoy vessels. The ship, which had been traveling beside the convoy, angled its course a fraction of a degree toward the convoy and inched up its speed. The change brought the destroyer closer to the convoy without a change in bearing. An observer on the convoy, assuming he could see the Cumberland at all, would see it hanging in the same position in the viewport but growing gradually nearer.

  “No sign of detection,” Bartoli announced after a few minutes.

  “Enemy sensor emissions are well below any reasonable estimate of their detection thresholds,” Kasparov added.

  “I’m confirming that, sir,” Nelson said from the Stealth console. “My systems’ internal sensors are detecting almost no energy being reflected in the direction of the enemy, and even less being emitted on our own systems.”

  “Outstanding. We don’t want these guys to know we’re here until after they’re dead.” A few heads turned at that peculiar turn of phrase, but not many and not much. By now these men were used to hearing things like that from their skipper.

  “Sir,” Bartoli said after ten more minutes had passed, “we’ll be at point victor in one minute.”

  “Very well. Officer of the Deck, this is a nuclear weapons launch order. I intend to launch the Talon missile in tube one and the Talon missile in tube two at the VIP transport.”

  “Nuclear weapons launch order acknowledged and logged. Confirming missile programming. Input and confirmed. Missiles in tubes one and two are ready to launch in all respects, save only that missile outer doors are closed.” Levy was able to accomplish all of these steps because for this watch, perhaps by no coincidence, he was Officer of the Deck as well as serving in his normal billet of Weapons Officer.

  “Very well. Open missile doors on all tubes.”

  Levy hit the key for each of the three tubes, watched the status lights change, and then checked the video feed from the inside of each tube. “Outer missile doors open on tubes one, two, and three. Visual feed confirms that all three doors are open and all tubes unobstructed.”

  “Very well.”

  “Skipper,” Bartoli said, “we’re at point victor.”

  “Very well. Maneuvering, execute maneuver as planned—unmask tubes one and two. Main sublight to Full. Weapons, fire tubes one and two as soon as we get within 2500 kilometers of the target. I don’t want the point-defense systems from that tanker swatting those missiles down. Fire three as soon as the first missile detonates.”

  Both men acknowledged their orders. Under LeBlanc’s direction, the ship turned so that the bow faced the enemy formation and then accelerated toward it. Within a few seconds, the Krag on board the convoy ships were aware of the destroyer’s approach, as evidenced by the powering up of their point-defense systems.

  “Mr. Levy, after we destroy the admiral’s ship, I don’t want to hang around longer than we have to waiting for missile tubes to be reloaded. Let’s bring pulse-cannons one, two, and three to PREFIRE so that we can take out the tanker and then the freighter immediately after we destroy the transport.”

  “Aye, sir,” Levy acknowledged. “Pulse-cannons one, two, and three to PREFIRE.” A few seconds later: “Tubes one, two, and three at PREFIRE.”

  “Very well. Bring all three tubes to READY.”

  “Aye, sir. Pulse-cannons one, two, and three to READY.” Three lights changed from orange to green on Levy’s pulse-cannon status screen. “Pulse-cannons one, two, and three now at ready. No targets yet designated.”

  “Lock all three on the tanker.”

  “Sir,” Bartoli said uncertainly, “the tanker has initiated a left roll. Otherwise, neither she nor the ammo carrier are doing anything. No evasive, no weapons, nothing. If we hadn’t already escaped our enemy trap for this mission, I might be getting nervous.”

  So would I. But I want to get that damn admiral.

  Max pulled up a few displays on his console, trying to figure out what was going on. He found no satisfactory answers.

  This is damn peculiar.

  “Kasparov,” Max said with what he hoped wasn’t too much alarm, “I want a high-magnification visual on the deuterium tanks on that tanker that are facing us. Pronto.”

  “Understood.” Kasparov spoke rapidly into his headset. The visual-scanner man in the Sensors Back Room was on the ball, because it wasn’t five seconds before Kasparov answered, “Up. Channel U.”

  Max, DeCosta, Kasparov, Bartoli, and a few others tied their displays into that channel and were rewarded by a close-up view of a deuterium tank slowly rolling to face the destroyer. When Max looked closely, he could see that the seams between one of the side sections of the tank, forming about an eighth of the long cylinder that made up all of the tank except for the domes on each end, were darker and more distinct than the others. Looking even closer he could see tiny bumps on that section.

  Shit. It’s a Q-ship.

  Max found himself on his feet, the rush of adrenalin too great for him to remain sitting. “Weapons, set all three pulse-cannons for minimum acceleration on the coils. Target all three cannons on that deuterium tank. Immediately upon firing, fire tubes one and two, same target.” He didn’t wait for an acknowledgment. “Maneuvering, as soon as those weapons are fired, execute evasive Sierra Hotel. Deflectors, be ready to surge. Alerts, notify all hands: prepare to receive fire.”

  While those orders were being acknowledged, Max leaned over and whispered to DeCosta, “XO, I need you, Mori, the doctor, and Nurse Church in the captured assault shuttle. Save a seat for me, but if I tell you to go, you go, no questions asked.” In response to the executive officer’s questioning look, Max said, “Listen, Ed, no time to explain. Just do it.”

  DeCosta nodded and dashed out of CIC.

  It took less than five seconds for Levy to fire the pulse-cannons, sending three balls of highly energetic plasma toward the deuterium tank. They were traveling at only about 1500 meters per second because, if fired at their normal velocity from so close to the target, the hole in the deflectors through which the weapons had been fired would not have time to close before they detonated. Two seconds later, the Talon missiles left their tubes.

  At the same moment, powerful pyrotechnics detonated around the deuterium tank seam that had so alarmed Max, severing that section from the rest of the tank. A third of a second later, the innocuous-looking bumps on the section revealed themselves to be tiny rocket engines that pulled the section away from what was left of the tank.

  Exposing a Parable class particle-beam cannon. The kind of particle-beam cannon that one mounted on a good-size moon or small planet because it was too big to put
on a ship—that is, unless you put it and its huge power supply in one of the gigantic deuterium tanks that the Krag stuck on the side of one of their even more enormous tankers. The weapon was powerful enough to punch through the strongest deflectors and armor. Two or three hits could obliterate a battleship.

  The monster weapon had already accumulated a charge and was ready. As soon as the tank panel was clear, the huge Krag weapon’s targeting scanners locked on, the beam tunnel aligning with the Cumberland, and the weapon fired its deadly beam for what was supposed to be three Krag standard heartbeats, which was close enough to three seconds as to make no difference.

  But after the beam had fired for only four-hundredths of a second, the pulse-cannon bolts fired a moment before by the Union ship struck the tanker’s suddenly much stronger deflectors. Although the pulse-cannon bolts did not penetrate the deflectors, the electromagnetic pulse created by the detonation of the Cumberland’s pulse-cannon bolts scrambled the Krag weapon’s aiming systems, causing the firing mechanism to shut down as a safety precaution to prevent unintended damage from an unaimed shot.

  Although four-hundredths of a second was all the time that the Krag weapon was striking the Cumberland, four-hundredths of a second was more than enough. The beam, about two and a half meters across, punched right through the destroyer’s deflectors and the hull, main engineering, the main cargo bay, main fire control, the galley, a row of crew quarters, auxiliary fire control, the main computer core, and then out through the hull right behind the main sensor array.

  Before the men on board the Cumberland had time to take a breath, the missiles they had recently fired struck back. The 150 kilotons of energy unleashed by each of the two fusion warheads carried by the Talon missiles pushed through the Krag deflectors weakened by the pulse-cannon bolts of a few seconds before, obliterating the false tank and tanker in a swirling orgy of fusing hydrogen, made all the more violent when the destruction reached the tanker’s five gigantic fusion reactors. The explosion was so catastrophic that it showered debris at tens of thousands of feet per second in every direction, including a 2632-kilogram piece of reactor shielding that tore through the VIP transport, nicking the fusion reactor containment vessel, causing a jet of fusion plasma to escape and obliterating the ship. Anyone on the VIP transport was certainly dead. Another fragment struck the main sublight drive of the ammunition carrier, temporarily knocking it off-line.