Star Force: Aquatics (SF31)

by Aer-ki Jyr

  Voru saw hundreds of small craft zipping in past the towers’ impotent attempts to target them. Once at the base of the tower they were being engaged by both its own perimeter defenses along with the city defense forces. The two engagements at the towers appeared about equally numbered while the bulk of the lizard underwater fleet sat out of range and continued to feed reinforcements into the tower battles.

  Amongst the enemy fleet were several large lizard aquatics ships…mostly carriers for their infantry, but there were three cruisers in amongst them, with what looked like multiple destroyer escorts. More than enough firepower to assault the city shield should they get past the towers and other turret defenses, meaning this was no mere skirmish. They were making a serious play for the city.

  “Helm, head us straight for their capital ships. Launch squids in our wake and tell the Archon to do the same.”

  Vander-6933 was straddling the pommel seat of his ‘streak,’ the underwater cousin of the aerial’s skeet, when the deployment order came over the comm. He was already waiting in the small underside launch bay of the Black Pearl, which was schematically squeezed between the much larger squid launch bays that ran the length of the ventral side of the battleship, and only had to nudge the throttle to punch through the containment shield holding the internal bay water separate from that of the ocean.

  The needle-like nose of the streak poked through the differential containment shield, widening the breach until the conical midsection of the attack craft reached its maximum width, then the shield reformed as the thinner tail segment passed through. Vander accelerated the craft slightly, passing through a ‘waterlock’ before getting to a second shield that finally let him exit the aft of the ship.

  Once through the second shield he punched the throttle, using the internal anti-grav engine to push it out while maintaining a slight downward angle to null out the lifting property of the differential thrust, which was pushing off the aft half of the planet, but since it was located below the streak it was also providing an unwanted upwards vector in addition to the lateral. When in the air or space this wasn’t relevant, because the anti-grav was already pushing against the planet to maintain altitude, so that ‘push’ was simply scaled back to maintain position.

  In the water gravity was no threat, so any unwanted upwards vector had to be compensated for…which Vander accomplished by nosing down enough that the angle of the streak acted like a fin, dragging it downward slightly. That wasn’t the most efficient way to move about, but it wasn’t relevant at the moment, for all he wanted to do was get clear of the Black Pearl before the squids started coming out.

  When his movement and that of the battleship pulled the gap between them to over 400 meters Vander turned the streak to starboard, causing the pointy cylinder to bend along the middle, arcing the needle-like nose and using the hull itself as a maneuvering fin. It curved around in a tight U-turn and accelerated forward, bearing to port to get alongside the battleship as the streak’s speed increased…but then the Archon cut out the anti-grav and leveled the nose of his underwater fighter out, activating the jet engines and running them up to full power.

  Small inlets on the middle of the craft opened just aft of the widest portion, pulling water in towards a concentration tube from 8 locations. That tube then sent the compressed water off in multiple directions inside the streak along tiny lines to provide maneuvering thrust, with the bulk of the water going directly aft to the main nozzle and launching it out the blunt tail.

  Vander’s streak shot forward again, this time faster than before, punching through the ocean water as the silver hull of the craft became coated in shiny gloss as the defense shields activated and responded to the pressure of the water flowing over them. The speed he was moving drained them of some energy, as was typical, but they held steady at 94% strength as the power core fed additional energy in to replace that which was lost to the friction.

  The streak’s battlemap flickered with new glowing icons coming out the aft of the Black Pearl, and though Vander couldn’t see them from his holographic view…which was enhanced with sensor data in the form of computer projected overlays onto the limited visuals he was getting from the hull of the streak…he could see them being tagged as independent allied units as they cleared the containment shields of their own bays, save they weren’t staggered, coming out in close sequence like the battleship was dropping two trails of crumbs behind it.

  The crumbs began to move of their own accord, gathering into formations and flanking the battleship as they caught up, but Vander knew they weren’t quick enough to catch his streak so he put them out of mind for the moment and focused on the enemy fleet formation ahead.

  There were eight big ships, too far away for him to have a hope of seeing visually, despite the running lights the lizard ships traditionally displayed once in battle. His view of the clear waters ahead was dim due to the depth he was at, but every now and then he’d see a bit of light to port coming from Manaan, though he was still too far out to see the city lights…meaning it had to be coming from the defense towers.

  He was beyond their range, comfortably, as was the lizard fleet ahead as he closed in on the enemy quickly. Depressing the nose he began to drag the streak further down below their elevation, searching for the seafloor visually even as the hologram and battlemap electronically displayed its location. Fast as his ship was swimming, it took him a while to get down there, then he leveled off 20 meters above the rough, irregular rocky ground and sped across the shrinking gap to the lizard ships, seeing a line of ‘ants’ popping up on his sensors in greater detail.

  The ants were lizards swimming towards the city. They were a biological variant designed to swim and breathe in the water, meaning they weren’t in craft, but rather ‘hoofing’ it across the gap on their own power, with more and more pouring out of the sides of several of the big lizard ships ahead.

  Vander picked one of those points and tagged it on his battlemap as a personal target…with a visual waypoint popping up on his holographic display marking the exact spot.

  The Archon primed the four torpedoes he had onboard, glad he’d had the streak rearmed after their last little skirmish, and opened the launch tube set on the topside of the needle-nose. No water entered, due to the shield overtop of it, but when the moment to fire came the streak’s computer would quickly deactivate that section of the shield to allow egress of the warhead, then snap it back into place to maintain the smoothness of the flow lines as much as possible.

  Vander knew there would be a firing ‘bump,’ but that was unavoidable when launching from speed and he mentally prepared himself for it as he saw the enemy ships began to get higher from his point of view, though they weren’t actually gaining altitude, he was just starting to get underneath them.

  Happy that the stream of infantry was still pouring out of his target, meaning they wouldn’t have had a chance to close the bay doors or raise the shields, Vander waited for the proper moment, already having mentally plotted out his trajectory, then activated the anti-grav engine and added its thrust…along with the upwards momentum…to the jet propulsion he’d already maxed out.

  Like the skeets, the streak also had its own ‘super pursuit mode,’ and it allowed the Archon to move faster than any lizard craft could hope to, making Vander feel like he was literally flying through the water. As the streak slowly lifted up towards the waypoint he adjusted his trajectory, keeping his aiming sight on the open bay door that was growing large by the second…with only a few more remaining before he slammed into the side of the carrier.

  Mind the bump, he reminded himself as he thumbed the firing button.

  The silver needle that was the streak shot in towards the lizard infantry transport on a perfectly smooth line, then it jerked ever so slightly as a tiny piece of it lazily shot out the front end. The streak bent hard at the middle, curving its hull line and trajectory so that it pulled up and passed over the top of the carrier as the torpedo it’d launched slipped insid
e the bay doors, knocking a number of infantry aside on the way in.

  Vander couldn’t see the detonation, for it was internal, but he saw a hiccup in his climb as the pressure wave rebounded out of the confines and ironically helped to push him upwards as he shot overtop the ship, holding onto the anti-grav ascension for a few more seconds then flicking it off and snaking around in a tight, jet-propelled turn to come up on the aft end of one of the lizard cruisers.

  That was too big of a target for his lone streak so he didn’t try, but it did try to swat at him, sending an expanding arm out in his direction like a kid’s toy lightsaber that extended up out of the hilt…save for this version had exploding nubs along the length, meaning that if it contacted his streak it’d get a nice detonation directly on the shields and really ruin the Archon’s day.

  Quick as the tendril was, it wasn’t quick enough, and Vander had no problem maneuvering around it…for it could only extend quickly in a straight line, then almost drift about to other locations on its bendable frame because it had to push water out of the way, making it more of an explosive net strand than a weapons battery.

  Then again he was piloting an agile ship. The squids the Black Pearl were bringing with it to the battle were not so agile, and the lizards had been making good use of the defense tendrils in an anti-air fashion, though that term didn’t quite apply underwater, so they’d come to call such things ‘point defense’ weapons.

  There were several smaller targets ahead, akin to gunboats that the lizards used as slow fighters. They’d nicknamed them ‘sharks’ for the multiple fins they had spread around a double hull that reminded Vander of TIE Bombers from Star Wars. The fins allowed them to pivot at sharp angles and turn around on pursuing ships…just as three of them did now on his approach, launching tiny ‘minnows’ his way.

  The automated missiles locked onto his streak and zipped towards him, leaving Vander with three options…try and outrun them, outmaneuver them, or take them out before they hit him.

  Mentally calculating his odds he opted for the third, cutting thrust and letting the streak drift forward for a second as he raised a pair of nubs on the hull’s surface, with the shields altering to accommodate the bumps. From them fired even smaller projectiles…the aquatics version of naval intercepts. Nine of the tiny, pen-sized objects were shot out of the pods towards the 3 incoming minnows, getting about halfway there before their momentum started to fade out from the friction of the water, despite their needle-like shape. When they slowed their short-lived internal batteries activated a tiny jet engine and maneuvering fins, turning them into self-propelled anti-missile missiles that tracked towards the lizards’ minnows.

  Vander reactivated his own jet propulsion before they made the intercept, knowing the little devices were quite effective at what they did…as well as knowing that the sharks had many more of their own to fire. Before that happened he closed range with the nearest one and buzzed it, dropping a bowling ball-sized hockey puck in its wake. The small drone swam the remaining meters down to the shark and latched itself to the side, bypassing the pyrotechnic arm that made up the second half of the lizards’ weaponry.

  The little plasma mine sucked itself down to the hull, chemically welding itself in place as Vander swiveled his streak around, launching more intercepts at additional minnows coming his way from other sharks moving into the fray. As he danced his sea snake around an activation light appeared on his control board, indicating that the remote mine was now in place. With a touch of a button he detonated it, causing the hockey puck to produce a plasma flare directly into the side of the shark like a roman candle firework.

  It burnt into and gutted the inside of the shark, taking it out of the fight while maintaining hull integrity and not allowing so much as one drop of water inside. Getting plasma to the target was the lizards’ primary hindrance underwater, given that they couldn’t launch it from point to point, and they’d become innovative in creating weapons to circumvent that problem…as had Star Force.

  Finding himself with way too many sharks around to play with, Vander kicked in his anti-grav and ran hard away from the group, outdistancing several of the minnows while taking one to the hull. It exploded prior to contact with the shield as the streak maneuvered to the left, diminishing the range indicator’s closing speed enough that the minnow assumed that it might not reach the target and detonated once it reached proximity.

  Due to the few meters in between the damage to the shields was reduced, but the concussive wave buffeted the streak around something fierce, causing Vander to lose directional control for a moment as the controls seemed to fight him. Once it subsided he did a quick check of the status hologram on his right, which indicated no hull damage, but severely weakened shields over the aft/starboard quarter.

  His eyes flashed back to the battlemap to confirm no more minnows were closing on him, then he steered an evasive course around the shark formation that was trying futilely to keep pace behind him…then they suddenly broke off and return to the flank of the large lizard ships as they began moving en mass in towards the city.

  “Damn it,” Vander swore, realizing what they were doing as he saw the Black Pearl coming up on their other side. They knew they were about to get their asses kicked, even with their incoming reinforcements…so they’d decided to forego the slow method of taking down the nearest defense towers and just overwhelm them with numbers.

  It would work too, because as powerful as the towers were, it took time to kill aquatics ships…and the torpedoes they were carrying, big and slow as they were, would be moving too fast and in too great a number for the point defenses to take out. Vander knew the towers had larger intercepts than he was carrying to deal with the stronger torpedoes, but put that many ships up close and there was no way they were going to get them all.

  On the battlemap he saw the Black Pearl turn early, diminishing the distance it would have to travel if it fell in behind the fleet and instead angled to intercept it closer to the city, all the while sending its entire fleet of squids ahead as fast as they could move to engage the lizards before they overwhelmed the nearest tower.

  Take two out and they’d have a clear approach on the city defense fence, for the other four couldn’t overlap firing fields to cover more than those adjacent to them…which was why the lizard infantry and smaller ships were currently engaging only two of the towers.

  What to do? Vander knew he had to stay away from the firing zone, otherwise the detonations from the lizard torpedoes would crack his ship apart, not to mention those coming from the towers, though that wasn’t their primary weapon.

  He couldn’t take on the capital ships directly, and at best he could only damage the smaller ones…so he figured he might as well provide cover for those he could and curved his streak around and headed for the approaching squids, picking out the closest sharks to them and tagging them as priority targets, with his hologram marking them appropriately.

  Vander fought his anti-grav, nosing down heavily to drag him lower in altitude while crossing over the top of the lizard fleet as it transitioned ever closer to the city, then he went with jet engines only and swerved around on the flank of one of the sharks as it launched two minnows in towards the approaching squids.

  The Archon lined up his approach and came in quickly, glad to see the shark was preoccupied. When he got within 100 meters he nosed down and used his anti-grav to brake hard, skidding his streak to a stop less than 20 meters away.

  Vander powered up his primary weapon and the shields over the streak’s nose pushed out into a flat circle on the end of a cylinder like a battering ram. Using his jet engines Vander goosed it forward, dropping off distance meter by meter until the 12m long shield vacuum hit the lizard hull and morphed around it, maintaining a watertight seal.

  The Archon thumbed the plasma cannon firing button, sending a pulse into and through the gap directly into the side of the shark even as it began to move off. The blue plasma hit the hull a split second before shiel
d cylinder slid off the back of the moving shark, quickly filling with water.

  Vander flicked it off, letting the shields reset to their normal, hull tight mode, as he maneuvered the streak around to the back of the damaged shark…then he slid up behind it and extended the shield column again, butting it up against the back side and delivering a three shot salvo of plasma at pointblank range that cracked open the lizard craft via an internal explosion.

  The Archon pulled back enough to allow him to slither the ship to the side and accelerate away, moving towards the next closest isolated shark he could find as the squids finally got to the lizard fleet and the heavy fighting broke out.

  3

  The three big lizard aquatic cruisers and the 5 carriers held their line, heading straight for the nearest of the underwater towers with their destroyer escorts, but the support craft and smaller capital ships veered off to engage the squids as they began to get close and open up their forward arms, diminishing their speed greatly as they each angled towards their chosen target. Being flown remotely by pilots within the Black Pearl, the squids, each about the size of a small house, were expendable grappling weapon platforms. They contained no offensive torpedoes, but they did carry defensive intercepts that began launching en mass as the lizard sharks swooped in to engage them before they could come into contact with their target ships.

  Minnows were being shot off from all directions, along with larger torpedoes coming from the frigates who were three times the size of the squids and shaped like a stingray…flat and wide with a sharp edge to cut through the water laterally. They’d spun about and broke formation first, thus getting to the incoming squids ahead of the other lizard ships and they were pumping out sizeable torpedoes that the intercepts were having to swarm with multiple hits to take down.