by D. J. Holmes
“Very good Lieutenant, clear us of the station using maneuvering thrusters once the station releases us. When we’re five kilometers clear take us out of orbit and plot a course for V17. We’re going to re-join the fleet.”
“COMS,” James continued, “open a ship wide channel for me.”
“Channel open sir,” came the reply.
“Raptor,” James began, “this is your Captain speaking. You’ve all worked hard and our repairs are complete. We’ll be heading to the V17 system. There we’ll be joining the blockade under Admiral Cunningham. Hopefully Admiral Zheng will surrender peacefully but, if not, we need to be ready to fight. Make sure you get some rest over the next few hours. Once we get to V17 we’ll be on permanent standby. Somerville out.”
As he finished his short speech, James looked over the Gupta. She nodded to him before going back to her duties. James knew he owed her a great debt. She could easily have reported him and relieved him of command. Instead she had risked his anger to help him. She would make a good Captain someday, he only hoped she would live to get the opportunity.
*
It took Raptor seven hours to break orbit and then a further four to jump to the fleet’s coordinates at V17. Admiral Cunningham had most of his heavy ships split into two squadrons. Each squadron was at an opposite end of the system, three light days from the mass shadow. The smaller frigates and survey ships of the fleet were patrolling the edge of V17’s mass shadow, watching the Chinese fleet. Splitting his fleet gave the Admiral the greatest degree of flexibility. No matter which way the Chinese Admiral tried to take his fleet out of the system both elements of the British fleet could jump into a blocking position. Usually splitting up a fleet could spell disaster but this strategy also gave the blockading fleet a chance to intercept any ships that tried to enter the system.
James had set course for the nearest section of the fleet. Rear Admiral Jensen was in charge and he expected to either be slotted into her squadron or have orders waiting for him to join the second squadron under Admiral Cunningham.
When his ship had been detected, he had been immediately requested to repair on board Jensen’s battlecruiser Valkyrie. As he had been flown across, James had been able to get a good look at all the ships under Jensen’s command. She had a total of two battlecruisers, four heavy cruisers, five medium and another six light cruisers. There were also thirteen destroyers, one of which was Ghost, and James had spotted at least ten point defense frigates and corvettes also backing up the heavier ships.
Once on board, he was immediately shown into Rear Admirals’ office. She stood to greet him and shook his hand. “It’s good to see you again Captain. I was glad to see that my decision to put you in charge of Raptor proved to have been justified.” As she sat down and motioned for James to do likewise, she studied him for several moments. “Is everything alright? You don’t look too well.”
“Everything is fine sir, I have just had some personal issues to deal with. Nothing I can’t handle,” James lied.
“In that case let me bring you up to speed. In total the Chinese now have two battleships, three battlecruisers, seven heavy, ten medium and twelve light cruisers. They also have almost twenty destroyers and twenty-five frigates. They outnumber us on the larger scale of things but all the skirmishes we have had over the last months have bled them dry when it came to destroyers and frigates. If it comes to a shooting match, they’ll outgun us in terms of sheer numbers but our better point defense should more than even the odds. We’re expecting more reinforcements to trickle in as ships can be spared from other sectors as they stand down because of the cease-fire.
“We’ve also been promised a delegation from China to come out and make sure Zheng keeps the cease fire. As yet he still won’t believe us that his government has called an end to the war. Of course they didn’t, the provisional government has, though he doesn’t need to know that. The bottom line is that if he tries to make a break for it, we are to stop him at all costs. If he manages to get back to Chinese space, he will upset the peace process and possibly throw us back into a full-scale war. Do you have any questions?”
“No sir,” James answered, “I’m just eager to get our orders and to begin to integrate into the fleet. The crew of Raptor is raring to go sir.”
“Very well Captain. You’re being assigned to my Valkyrie’s covering flotilla. It’ll be your job to watch my rear. You’ll be joining the point defense corvette Hope, the flak frigate Defiance and a ship you are well familiar with, HSM Ghost. You can report to my Flag Captain after we are done here. He will take you through some of the finer details he has worked out with Captain Lightfoot regarding the defense of my flagship. For now, let us go over Admiral Cunningham’s plans if it comes to a large-scale fleet action.”
When James was finished with the Rear Admiral, he spent another hour with the Flag Captain going over the specific positions of the various ships protecting the flagship. He was also advised to make contact with the other Captains and commanders of the ships in his flotilla to introduce himself.
It was standard practice in the RSN that larger capital ships, such as heavy cruisers and battlecruisers, also have their own flotillas of smaller ships protecting them. Typically, two heavy cruisers would form a flotilla that would be filled with other ships ranging from corvettes to destroyers. A single battlecruiser was thought worthy of a flotilla of smaller warships all to herself. If it came to a larger fleet action, the remaining light and medium cruisers were all paired off, with each pair fighting together.
With the addition of the flak cannon technology to British tactics, Admiral Cunningham had altered the standard RSN battle formations. The idea was that as all the various flotillas joined together to form one combined fleet they would be able to overlap their flak cannon fire, to create a giant wall of shrapnel to fend off incoming missiles. To James, as both Rear Admiral Jensen went over the wider ideas of the various fleet formations and then as her Flag Captain went over the specifics for their flotilla, it look liked it should work. Though he didn’t know how anyone could command so many ships once the actual fighting broke out and the nice formations began to break up.
When he finally got back on board Raptor he sent all the data to Gupta for her and Romanov to review. He then went to lie down for a while before he had to go over it for a third time with them.
Chapter 30 - Blockade Runner
In the era of near instantaneous galactic communications, we forget that it once took weeks and months for orders to be sent from one planet to another. As in the days of sail, this communications lag often meant wars continued to be fought on the frontiers even after peace treaties had been signed.
-Excerpt from Empire Rising, 3002 AD
31st July, 2465 AD, HMS Raptor, outer edge of V17 system
James woke with a start. The COM unit built into his bed was beeping furiously, demanding his attention. He had been struggling to adjust his sleeping pattern over the last month. His dreams had been haunting him with what he had or could have had with Christine. They were taking a toll on him. Each morning he had to pull himself together before he could go out and face his crew. Fox was the only one who knew just how much he was still struggling but James was confident he could trust his steward.
Still a bit groggy, he tapped the COM unit, “What is it?”
“Captain. A frigate has just jumped to the fleet from V17.” Romanov informed him. “She’s reporting that a freighter, escorted by a number of small warships, has just jumped into the system. Jensen has ordered us to prepare to jump. She’s taking Valkyrie and her flotilla into the system in pursuit.”
“I’ll be on the bridge presently,” James replied. “When is the micro jump?
“Twenty seconds sir.”
“Very well, carry on without me until I get there.”
As James half sprinted from his quarters to the bridge, he felt the subtle shift in the inertial dampeners indicating that Raptor had entered shift space. By the time he had sat down
another subtle shift signaled they had reached the edge of the V17 system. With Valkyrie at the center of her flotilla, the ships all began to accelerate along the intercept course Valkyrie’s navigation officer had plotted based on the data from the scouts.
It only took a matter of seconds for Raptor’s sensors to begin to update the main holo plot of the system. The gravimetric data indicated there were a number of Chinese ships maneuvering around in the inner system. There were too many to really make heads or tails of. Further out it was a different story. All the British scout ships were hiding in stealth and so couldn’t be detected. This meant the freighter and its escorts were the only ships moving. They had obviously altered course slightly from when the scout had detected them. As soon as Valkyrie’s navigation officer spotted the course change, an updated heading was sent to the flotilla and they turned in pursuit.
It only took the freighter a few seconds to react. Immediately it doubled its acceleration. James was impressed. He hadn’t seen a freighter that could come anywhere close to the acceleration this one was achieving. Obviously someone had upgraded it substantially. As the two escorts accelerated to match its speed the sensor officer was able to get a better read on them.
“I estimate those two warships to be destroyers sir.”
“Stranger and stranger,” James said to the bridge. An upgraded freighter being escorted by two destroyers, whatever or whoever was on board that freighter was obviously important.
As if by magic, the inner system suddenly came alive with activity. Every ship even remotely close to the incoming freighter began to rapidly accelerate towards it, coming to its aid. “I guess they must have recognized their friend,” Romanov said. “A freighter with such acceleration has to be very rare. It must be known to someone in the Chinese fleet.”
“Indeed,” James said. As he continued to watch, the two destroyers escorting the freighter began to decelerate. It seemed they wanted to cross swords with Valkyrie and her escorts. They probably hoped to slow Valkyrie down enough to let the freighter escape. They had made a mistake though, potentially a fatal one.
Rear Admiral Jensen saw the flaw in their plan as well as James, for his command chair beeped to alert him that she was requesting a COM link. When he approved the link he saw Captain Lightfoot had been included as well. “Gentlemen,” she began, “it seems our targets have forgotten about your extra acceleration. When I give the order, I want you two to take off all the safeties and boost to your maximum acceleration. Get your gaseous shields on too and run that freighter down. Whatever they are carrying it must be important. We can’t let them make contact with the Chinese fleet.”
“Aye sir,” both James and Lightfoot said in unison. Jensen only nodded and then cut the transmission.
“COM, get me the Chief,” James requested. Moments later the Chief appeared on his command chair holo display. “Chief, we’re going to need everything you can give us from the engines and the reactors. In less than five minutes I’m going to ask you to boost us up to one hundred and ten percent military power. We’ll keep holding that acceleration until we reach our maximum velocity.
The Chief looked a little nervous, “We can certainly configure the engines to do that but Raptor hasn’t been taken to one hundred and ten percent since her space trials. Even then it was only for a very short burn to stress test everything. I can’t guarantee what will happen.”
“I know the risks Chief,” James replied, “I have every confidence in you. If it looks like there is going to be an overload in the engines you have my permission to reduce power without waiting for authorization.”
“Yes sir, I’ll begin making the preparations now then,” the Chief said as he closed the COM channel.
With the rate the two Chinese destroyers were decelerating, it only took them fifteen minutes to reach the point of no return. As Valkyrie and her flotilla were accelerating hard after the freighter, which itself was still accelerating to get to its top speed, the destroyers, having lost a great deal of momentum, couldn’t hope to make it back to the freighter. As they crossed the line where they couldn’t reverse course, both Ghost and Raptor shot forward from the flotilla. They both angled away from the approaching Chinese warships to remain out of their missile range. Immediately, the two Chinese ships tried to alter course to intercept the two British destroyers but it was easy for James and Lightfoot to keep altering their course to keep them at arm’s length. The differing velocities meant that the Chinese ships had no chance of catching them.
Whoever was commanding the freighter quickly realized their mistake, for the freighter increased its acceleration again. They must have taken the safeties off their engines for the freighter shot forward with another five percent increase in its acceleration. When the plot updated, it was clear to James the freighter still wasn’t going to make it to the ships coming up out of the inner system in time. What did concern James was that both Ghost and Raptor were close to getting into trouble themselves. After catching the freighter, they would have to decelerate hard if they were to get back out of the system before the Chinese warships coming out to greet them got into range. If either ship encountered a problem with their engines they might not be able to escape.
Over the next ten minutes, slowly but surely Ghost and Raptor began to overhaul the freighter. James had been analyzing the freighter closely on the visual images they were now getting. He was looking for any other surprises the upgraded freighter might have. It was clearly armed with a lot more point defense weapons than the typical freighter.
As Romanov reported that Valkyrie had opened fire James switched his attention back to the battle with the two Chinese destroyers. They were both accelerating hard, right for the battlecruiser. The commanders had clearly accepted their failure to protect the freighter and were trying to get into plasma cannon range of the battlecruiser to at least do some damage to her. It seemed they were unlikely to succeed, as twenty-three missiles from Valkyrie and the rest of her flotilla homed in on the two destroyers. In response, they fired off ten missiles of their own. James knew the point defenses of Valkyrie alone could handle that many, with the flak frigate and the point defense corvette cruising along beside her, they would pose no threat.
The closing speed of the two groups of ships ensured that the missiles from Valkyrie reached the Chinese ships before they could fire off another salvo. Their point defenses put up a good fight destroying fifteen of the incoming missiles, but the rest enveloped both ships in a shroud of nuclear explosions. James couldn’t make out if any of the missiles got a direct hit but as the sensors cleared it didn’t matter. Both destroyers were drifting wrecks. As James watched, a secondary explosion aboard one ripped what was left of the ship in two. The other one was clearly trying to arrest its erratic spin with its maneuvering thrusters but there weren’t enough of them left to succeed. Suddenly a number of escape pods began to launch from it. James guessed the Captain had given up saving the ship and was getting his crew off before the British ships came into plasma range.
“Sir,” Romanov said to get his attention, “Captain Lightfoot has sent over a firing plan for your approval.”
“Thank you,” James acknowledged. He then brought up the plan. Lightfoot wanted both Ghost and Raptor to turn broadside onto the freighter once they got into range and fire four missiles each. Cutting their acceleration would let the freighter get away but there was no way it could survive a salvo of eight missiles.
“Tell him I approve,” James ordered. The he turned to the navigation officer, “Jackson, make the turn when Ghost gives the order. Romanov, be ready to fire.”
Less than a minute later, eight missiles streaked out after the frigate. Ghost and Raptor then began to decelerate to allow themselves to escape the approaching Chinese warships that would be out for revenge. The flight time of the missiles was going to be over twenty five minutes as the freighter was continuing to pile on speed. As the time passed, James continued to watch the freighter on the visual feed. A number
of compartments opened to reveal extra point defense plasma cannons. In total, the freighter seemed to have the defenses of a frigate. Still it would have real difficulty dealing with eight missiles.
Sure enough, as the freighter’s point defenses began to engage the missiles they weren’t able to destroy them quick enough. Five missiles made it through its defenses and two scored direct hits. As the sensor feeds cleared up after the explosions there was no sign of the freighter or of any escape pods.
“Sir,” the COM officer called out. “I’m picking up a transmission from the freighter. It must have sent it out just seconds before being destroyed. It contains a visual feed and a large data packet. Neither has been encrypted.”
James wasn’t surprised. It would have been very hard for a civilian to get a Chinese military data encrypter, even for someone who was obviously able to get their hands on military grade plasma cannons. “Put the visual on screen, then give me a rundown of the data packet,” James commanded.
An image of a young Chinese man appeared. James reckoned he couldn’t be more than mid-twenties. He spoke in Chinese but the computer’s translation program put sub titles onto the visual image. “Father,” he began, “I’ve tried to contact you but all my attempts were intercepted. This was the last thing I could think of. There has been a coup. Minister Na has overthrown the Politburo and is trying to make peace with the British. He has arrested many of the senior military officers loyal to Chang for war crimes and has confiscated most of our wealth. I couldn’t stop him. I’m sorry for failing you. I have shamed our family, I only hope you can use this information to undo my shame.”