Alarm of War v-1

by Kennedy Hudner

  “Stop,” ordered Grant.

  “Of course, dear,’ Mildred said. Grant recalled the London’s computer had been programmed by the Cornwall Software Collective on Aberdeen, which was rumored to have the highest percentage of grandmothers of any of the software combines. It gave the ship’s AI a distinctive personality.

  “Analyze the sensor data of the Tilleke ships pursuing the Dominion force,” Grant ordered. “Were the Tilleke ships overtaking the DUC force?” His hands were sweating now.

  “No, not during the forty three minute, fifteen second period that we were tracking both of them.”

  Commander Kerrs turned to Admiral Skiffington. “Admiral, does this feel to you like it’s going a little too well?”

  Skiffington gave him a cold stare. Kerrs had been with him for years, and in terms of personality was his perfect counterfoil. Oliver Skiffington was brash, boastful, arrogant and could be aggressive to fault…and he knew it. He kept Kerrs on his staff because Kerrs wasn’t afraid of him, unlike virtually all of his other subordinates. Kerrs’s function was to tell the Admiral when he was overreaching. Skiffington valued that, even when he didn’t like it.

  “Don’t play games, Oscar. Spit it out.”

  “Well, Admiral, if I were the Tilleke Emperor, my biggest problem would be how to defend Qurna against a larger, more powerful force. It would help a lot if I could know what path that force would take toward my home planet because if I knew, then I could lay ambushes. And if I had studied the opposing commander, and knew he was exceptionally aggressive, well, Admiral, you know what they say when you’re hunting a lion?”

  “Goddammit, Oscar, just say it!”

  Kerrs continued, unperturbed. “Those Tilleke ships out there are bait. We’re being suckered, Admiral. We aren’t chasing them, we are following them. They know exactly where we are going to be.”

  Dangle some bloody tempting bait right in front of my nose and watch me chase it! Admiral Skiffington glowered for a long, hard moment, then let it go and turned to the problem of the enemy. They had been chasing the Tilleke force towards Qurna for close to fifteen hours now, plenty of time for the goddamn Tilleke to lay in a surprise. And if he were the Tilleke admiral, that surprise would be…

  “Sensors!” he bellowed. “Check our path of advance! Out to ten minutes. Look for small objects, but lots of them!”

  Two junior sensor officers glanced at each other in bewilderment, and then hastened to comply. All sensors had been focused on the retreating Tilleke strike force, some fifty minutes out, but now they recalibrated to sweep the area two seconds to ten minutes in front of the advancing Victorian Fleet. The hologram display blinked off, then flared to life with the new data. Everyone on the deck turned to study it.

  “And there it is,” Oliver Skiffington said softly. Two minutes in front of them there were forty to fifty objects laid out in three long lines, directly along their line of advance. They were barely visible on the sensor display, but they were there. He turned to Kerrs.

  “Missile mines.”

  Kerrs nodded. “I concur, Admiral.”

  Across the control room, the Chief Sensors Officer’s head jerked up from his display. “Admiral! DMB flare! The Tilleke ships are slowing down and turning to face us!”

  Admiral Skiffington took a deep breath. This was going to be very close. There are no crisp turns in space, just long curving ones. “All ships, minefield to our front! Turn ninety degrees upward now! Execute!” Then he turned back to Kerrs and growled:

  “Next time you’ve got something to say, Commander, say it sooner!”

  “Yes, sir,” Kerrs said, without even a hint of contrition.

  Oblivious to the commotion around him, Grant asked nervously. “Mildred, what was the speed of the Dominion force while they were being pursued by the Tilleke?”

  “Four point two C.” Four and two tenths percent of the speed of light. At that speed, the Tilleke force had not been able to overtake the Dominion force. But now, the Fleet couldn’t catch the Tilleke force, even though the Fleet was going faster than the DUC force had been. That could only mean…

  “Bugger me!” Grant bolted out of his chair. “Mildred, give me the present location of the DUC ships!”

  In the Emperor’s Pride, Prince RaShahid studied the display. His force sat slightly off center of the Victorian line. The Vicky right was curling around in an arc to encircle him. In a few moments he would be surrounded.

  Everything was in place.

  I have three surprises for you, he thought to the Victorian fleet.

  “Let us begin,” he said.

  “Lord!” the Select Freeman (Sensors) shouted. “The Victorian Fleet has changed course. They are now pitching upwards. They must have seen the minefield.”

  RaShahid looked at the display in consternation. The Vickies were in a long, curving skid, trying to change their forward motion by ninety degrees, but unable to turn crisply enough to keep out entirely of the missile field. The ambush wouldn’t be perfect, but with luck it would be enough.

  “Order the platforms to fire!”

  Whisker lasers stabbed out from the Emperor’s Pride to fifty missile platforms that had been seeded along the path of the Victorian advance. The platforms had been tracking the Victorian ships using passive sensors, but now active sensors sprang to life, reaching out hungrily to the Victorian ships.

  “Targeting radar!” the Sensors Officer shouted. “Someone has locked onto us with targeting radar.”

  “Full defensive array. AI control,” Admiral Skiffington barked.

  “Charge the defense arrays,” Commander Kerrs ordered.

  “Multiple contacts! There are at least thirty or more targeting sources out there.”

  “Target with lasers and fire!” Skiffington shouted.

  “Missiles! Missile launch from port and starboard. They seem to be targeting the cruisers. Must be…over one hundred missiles inbound. Impact in two minutes!”

  Admiral Skiffington sat back in disgust. Through his own stupidity he had given the initiative to the enemy. Going to cry in your beer, Oliver? “Keep turning away from the minefield for fifteen minutes, then pitch back towards the Tilleke strike force,” he ordered. “All missiles are to be fired on my command.” He turned to the sensors console. “Sensors, locate who the hell is shooting at us so we can shoot them back!”

  The missile platforms were the first little surprise. Distracted by the constant missile volleys of the fleeing Tilleke ships, and partially blinded by the clouds of chaff left behind, the Victorian ships had paid scant attention to the faint, smudgy returns on their sensor screens. The missile platforms were small, with heavily shielded power sources and a crew of only five Savak. The missiles they fired were small, too, but they only had to fire a short distance and each of the fifty platforms carried five missiles. Six of the platforms malfunctioned. Five refused to fire at all; the sixth blew up. But the remaining forty four worked just fine, spewing more than two hundred short range missiles in sprint mode into the Vicky war fleet.

  “Mildred, where are the Dominion ships!” Grant screamed.

  “The eleven ships — three energy cruisers, two missile cruisers, three energy destroyers and three missile destroyers — are now approximately three hundred miles behind the H.M.S. Sussex. They are proceeding at five per-”

  “It’s a trap,” Grant said despairingly. The whole thing was a deception to lure them here. He stepped to his father’s chair. “Admiral, we have to warn the Sussex! The Duck-”

  “Sit down, Lieutenant,” his father snapped. “We’re a little busy just now!”

  “…five percent C,” Mildred concluded helpfully.

  “Father, please!”

  The DUC missile cruiser People’s Choice lined up a scant three hundred miles behind the Victorian battleship Sussex, knife fighting range in space warfare. The ten other Dominion ships were arrayed on either side of the cruiser.

  “Admiral, the Tilleke have fired their missiles,” h
is First Officer told him. That was the signal. Admiral Quigley glanced at his Weapons Officer.

  “Targets locked in,’ the WO confirmed. At three hundred miles they could hardly miss.

  Quigley nodded. “Let’s not keep our friends waiting. All ships, fire!”

  They weren’t taking any chances. The three E Class cruisers and two M Class cruisers were all targeted on the Sussex. The six destroyers aimed at two nearby Vicky cruisers. With luck the Vickies would never realize they were being hit from behind, but just in case, they needed to make sure the Sussex died quickly. When you take on a Vicky battleship, mused Quigley, be sure you kill it and don’t just piss it off!

  Nine heavy laser beams and twenty four ship-killer missiles shot out. The laser beams struck the battleship’s engine rooms and rear defense array, spalling metal and exploding munitions. Two of the ship’s engines were immediately destroyed and the resulting uneven thrust pushed the ship into a violent tumble. In the control room, Admiral Penn just had time to glance up in question. Seven seconds later the missiles struck all along the hull. The Sussex seemed to shiver, and then simply disappeared in a ball of light and molten debris.

  In less than ten seconds the flag ship of Victoria’s Third Fleet was gone.

  “Good,” said Admiral Quigley. “Now let’s kill the others.”

  And now the second surprise, thought Prince RaShahid. “Activate the second mine field.”

  As the right wing of the Victorian Fleet continued its curving chase toward the Tilleke ships, thousands of ship-killer proximity mines arose from their electronic sleep and scanned their assigned areas for targets.

  Targets were plentiful.

  Daisy chain explosions chased after the Victorian ships, white blossoms of superheated gas and plasma reaching out to caress the frigates and destroyers and cruisers on the periphery of the two battle groups that comprised the Second Fleet’s right wing. Some ships were destroyed outright, others crippled. At least six ships were left intact but powerless, beginning their Long Walk that would take them and their doomed crews out of human space and into the abyss.

  Of the forty ships that flew into the minefield, only twenty six flew out. Even as they emerged, battered and shaken, the Tilleke war hawks swooped down on them.

  “Sir, our right flank ran into a minefield. Alpha Battle Group is badly damaged; most ships are Code Omega or not battle capable!” the Sensors Officer called out, his voice trembling. “Half of Bravo is gone; the rest are under heavy fire from Tilleke war ships. On our left flank the two battle groups from Third Fleet report heavy damage. Sussex is gone, along with Farnham, Keswick, Salisbury and Poole. Others, too, but no ID yet. Many damage reports.”

  Admiral Skiffington sat in shocked disbelief. Close to half his fleet had been destroyed in a matter of minutes.

  “Admiral, your orders?” asked Commander Kerrs. “Admiral?”

  The Admiral pulled himself together with an act of will. Hurt or not, he still had one of the most powerful fleets in history, and by God he was going to use it!

  “Commander, order all ships into globe formation, battleships at the van. All weapons to bear on those sons of bitches attacking Bravo Group! Make it happen!”

  “Sir!’ Commander Kerrs replied, and snapped out orders to his crew.

  Standing behind his father, bewildered and overwhelmed, Grant Skiffington desperately wanted to believe that his father could pull them out of this nightmare.

  On the deck of the Emperor’s Pride, Prince RaShahid watched as the enemy fleet clumsily tried to regain some semblance of order. They were fools, but they had courage. No matter.

  He motioned to the communications officer. “Release the kraits. Remember, we want the two surviving battleships!”

  “At your command, Nobel Born.”

  The Prince searched through the holograph display until he found the H.M.S. London, then magnified it until he actually saw the outlines of the ship itself. He pictured Admiral Skiffington on its deck, no doubt studying his own holograph.

  Be bold, Admiral, he silently urged across the empty miles of space. Be bold so that I might utterly destroy you!

  Chapter 27

  The Kraits

  In Tilleke Space

  Krait, n, (krit) extremely venomous snake, originally from the Indian subcontinent of Earth; preferred method of attack is to spring from hiding. Bite is fatal.

  The First Sister Pilot looked down the long line of creche-born warriors, forty in all. Her heart filled with pride. In just a moment they would activate the transporters to send the forty warriors and five Sister Pilots into the enemy’s battleship. Nine other kraits would do the same, flooding the London with four hundred of the Emperor’s storm troopers and fifty trained pilots and engineers.

  “All glory to the Emperor!” she cried. “Remember your duty! You are Savak! Faith in the Emperor! Victory or martyrdom! Fear not death; you live through your brothers!”

  The forty men, anonymous in black uniforms, chest armor and helmets, raised gloved fists. “Victory or martyrdom!” they shouted in unison.

  First Sister Pilot activated the transporter. The air crackled and misted, then cold air gusted outward and snow swirled in a blustery cloud…then the forty men disappeared. She nodded in satisfaction and relief; the transporters were notoriously temperamental, but this time had worked flawlessly. She turned to her four sisters, seeing in each a younger reflection of her own face. “Come,” she said softly, and they crowded beside her in a tight circle, heads together, arms intertwined. “Prepare yourselves, for now we must do our duty to the Emperor, however perilous. All who die in duty to the Emperor shall be reborn in the creche.”

  They took five of the seats just used by the soldiers. No one would stay behind to operate the krait. All were committed to victory. First Sister Pilot looked at the others. Second and Third looked grimly determined; Fourth was pale and Fifth had her eyes screwed tightly shut. First Sister Pilot took a deep breath. “For the Emperor!” She pushed the control stud.

  “Hey, Chief, take a look at this.” In the engine room of the H.M.S. London, Chief Engineer Joan Mastromonico looked up in bewilderment as snow suddenly gusted across the main deck. What the hell? Snow? Then, through the blowing squall, she dimly saw dark shapes, hazy at first, then abruptly more substantial. The pieces of the puzzle fell into place. No, that can’t be! Teleportation is impossible! As she watched the shapes coalesce into men, she thought: How did they ever do that?

  Then one of the shapes stepped forward and shot her in the head.

  The London carried a contingent of two thousand four hundred crew, plus fifty Marines. There wasn’t much use for Marines in a space battle, except in the very rare cases where Marines were used to board an enemy vessel. Admiral Skiffington had used that tactic to seize a Dominion space station during the Battle of Windsor. In the few instances when land troops were needed, they were usually brought in separate troop transports, capable of holding up to ten thousand soldiers each, plus their fighting gear. As always in battle situations, there were two Marine guards stationed on the bridge. They were armed only with Bull Pups, and their presence was more to help out in the event one of the bridge crew became hysterical during a rough battle. It had happened.

  On the bridge, the Communications Chief’s console suddenly lit up like a Christmas tree. He listened to one frantic call, then another, then a third. Without consulting either the Commander or the Admiral, he pushed the stud that would allow him to broadcast throughout the entire ship. Then he spoke words never heard before on a Victorian Fleet warship: “Marines, stand to and repel boarders! This is not a drill! Repel all boarders!”

  Admiral Skiffington, in the midst of a hurried conference call with his remaining battle group leaders, looked up in astonishment. “What did he say?” he asked.

  The Savak swarmed through the corridors like ravenous wolves. Curious crewmen heard the commotion, stuck their heads out to see what was happening and were shot. A group of ten men and w
oman turned a corner and fell before a fusillade of pellets. The London was the size of a small village, with thousands of compartments, main corridors, branch corridors and utility shafts, but there were now four hundred armed men aboard with only one goal: kill all of the crew. Each of the creche-born warriors carried his rifle, four hundred rounds of ammunition and a spare pressure charge. Each man knew one certainty: There was no way off this enemy ship but through victory.

  Aret1 led the platoon that had been transported directly into the enemy’s engineering deck. They had secured it within a minute by the simple expedient of killing everyone there. Aret1 had left three men to hold it and had immediately begun moving toward the platoon’s second objective, the bridge. Other platoons were charged with cleaning out each compartment along the way. Aret1’s job was to neutralize the enemy bridge. Just as he left the engineering deck, he heard the crackle of the transporter as the five Sister Pilots arrived.

  “Move, move!” he urged on his troops. He had fifteen Arets, fifteen Brets and ten of the larger, lumbering Crets. He hadn’t wanted the Crets, too slow. Speed was the key. Speed and violence. One of the Crets stopped to shoot someone who had emerged from a compartment behind them. “Keep up!” snarled Aret1. Ahead a sailor was frantically trying to shut a bulkhead hatch. Aret1 smashed him aside, shoved open the hatch and plunged through. His platoon raced behind him, Bret4 pausing only long enough to shoot the moaning sailor in the head.

  Later, Corporal Cookie Sanchez would decide that she was saved only because she was in the armory, replacing a faulty power pack connector for her Bull Pup. It had taken her an hour to find the problem — a cracked solder — and she had just finished recharging her weapon when the ship’s intercom came on.

  “Marines, stand to and repel boarders! This is not a drill! Repel all boarders!”

  A Marine private working beside her at the repair bench looked up, mouth dropping open. “What the fuck?”