Victory at all costs (Spinward Book 3)

by Rupert Segar

  “This is the classic school book illustration of how hyper flight works. The folded waves are normal space while the semi-transparent blue layer just touching the bottom of every wave is the Realm. That’s how we manage to dramatically reduce the distance between any two points in normal space. It’s not really faster-than-light; we’re just taking a shortcuts.”

  “OK, Einstein, get on with it,” said the Head of Astronavigation. There were sniggers from some of the other science officers.

  Bonnie Blackheart ignored the caustic comment and tapped her pad. The layer cake turned itself into a bubble with the smooth semi-transparent blue Realm layer on the outside and the folded normal space inside.

  “This is how we think the Guardians turned their vessel into a singularity at Cygnus Prime and how they created the meteoroid missiles at the Marylebone gateway. Normal space holding a vessel or an asteroid is wrapped up in a hyperspace boundary. There’s lots of space inside but no surface area, a point singularity.”

  “How does this apply to what’s around us,” said Bartz becoming intrigued.

  “Look again,” said Bonnie Blackheart replaying the image as the layer cake folded itself into a sphere. “This time, the outer layer is normal space and the scrunched up stuff on the inside is subspace, like normal space but all folded up. We’re crawling up and down these waves getting nowhere really fast.”

  A short red line appeared on their screens, charting a line across the surface of some of the closely packed waves. The line wiggled up and down but hardly changed position.

  “And how exactly did they do this to us, “said Bartz appalled that the theory might actually be true.

  “Sir, I asked the Astronavigation department to review their external sensor logs around the time the forward view went blank,” said the UFOologist. “I am still awaiting a response.”

  “Astronavigation, what were the results?” barked Bartz.

  The Head of Astronavigation appeared flustered and was swiping and tapping his pad.

  “Hmm, … as a matter of course, the science department reviews all sensor logs. We found… we found …” the officer was beginning to perspire, “Yes! We found traces of flux ions but the readings could not be corroborated because we found both right handed and left handed ions together, which is impossible.”

  “Right handed and left handed flux ions annihilate one another in a huge explosion. Everyone knows that,” said the Astronavigator.

  “Not if one of them is an anti-matter flux ion,” said Blackheart. “Then, in theory, they can safely co-exist and might just form a boundary between normal space and subspace.”

  “And that leaves us,” said the vice admiral, now completely convinced that the UFOologist was correct, “stuck, like a fly on flypaper.”

  +

  The eighteen bubble fields maintained their protective blanket around Fair Isles. On the second day there was still no sign of any vessel from either half of the armada. The bubble fields, however, were no longer centred on the planet, they were beginning to move. One side of the bubble, in the direction of the sun, if only they could have seen it, was roughly 60 thousand kilometres closer to the planet than it had been. Suxie Wong explained the phenomenon to some of her younger cadets.

  “As soon as the field turned on the generators were lost in the centre of an almost infinite volume of space. They can’t even locate Fair Isles, let alone keep their relative position. Essentially, the dodecagon of rocky asteroids is moving ahead in a straight line at a uniform velocity which matched that of the planet two days ago. Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you look at it, the planet follows the curve of time space. We circle our sun.”

  “Will the planet crash into the bubble fields?” asked one fresh faced cadet.

  “No, Squashi, it’ll be alright,” said Suxie hoping her friend Dylan Moran had done his sums correctly.

  +++

  “Why can’t we just turn round using our gyroscopic gimbals and reverse our course?”

  Vice Admiral Bartz had summoned his UFOologist Bonnie Blackheart back to his ready room. All his senior officers, with the exception of the head of science, now backed the civilian woman’s theories; Bartz felt she was the one to trust.

  “In theory would could, sir, but we would need to stay on an exact course, to an impossible degree of precision. You see, every peak and trough that we’ve traversed is a point of inflection when the gradient of subspace is close to zero. The slightest deviation, an infinitesimal change, would result in the ship skipping to an altogether different fold in subspace. We can’t just turn round and go back.”

  “Well, what then? We can’t just stay trapped in here like a fly in amber. We must be able to do something.”

  “Tachyons, sir. I asked the Astronavigation Department if I could look for tachyons but they said they were too busy to give me any observation time. You see, anti-matter flux ions are not very stable and will decay into mesons and tachyons and a bunch of other sub-atomic bits and pieces. All of them are very short lived, except for the tachyons. In theory, tachyons will travel unimpeded across subspace.”

  “I love your theory,” said Bartz, a bulb going on in his head. “Detect tachyons and we find a light to bring us home.”

  +++

  The former head of astrophysics was calibrating the Heath Robinson device that Blackheart called her tachyon telescope. It was not actually made of brown paper and string, it just looked like it. The demoted scientist had been ordered to assist a woman he now hated more than any other person in the cosmos.

  “Here goes,” said Bonnie Blackheart, UFOologist and newly appointed head of astrophysics. She gingerly moved a bunch of cables that swamped her pad and dabbed an icon that looked like a fuzzy monster on the screen. “Go fetch,” she said.

  The former head of astrophysics looked over towards his successor, barely able to conceal his belief that he had been displaced by a charlatan.

  The wide vid screen that covered the far wall of the laboratory burst into life. Previously it has shown the rear view from the ship’s telescope. Now, overlaid on top was a meteor shower, streaks of light, all radiating from the same point. A computer generated circle and cross hairs centred on the radiant, the apparent origin of the shower. A twelve digit number gave a bearing and declination.

  “Sir, our course home,” said Bonnie over her comms link.

  “We see it, Miss Blackheart, my congratulations,” said Vice Admiral Bartz from the command deck. “We’re turning the ship now.”

  +

  Thousands of meteoroids raced round Fair Isle. They were organised into six separate polar orbits each 60 degrees apart from the next. Gravity engines fired and dislodged more than one hundred of the rocks from their orbit. They moved away from the planet, all on a similar course.

  “Squadron C stand by Bubble 1,” ordered Defence Commander Bazza Foster from his fighter. “Be prepared for incoming flux meteoroids.”

  “Standing by for target acquisition,” replied the Leader of Squadron C, eager to see some action after being held back from the earlier engagement.

  “Let’s hope our timing is good,” said Suxie Wong from here Coordination Centre on the island of Crete on Fair Isles.

  As Suxie spoke, Bubble 1 turned off. With the collapse of the inverted flux field, one corner of the dodecagon surrounding Fair Isles reverted to normal space. Inside a relatively narrow window, there were five Imperial cruisers on random courses.

  “Targets acquired,” said the leader of Squadron C. “Tasking flux meteoroids now.”

  Out of the spread of more than 100 meteoroids heading towards bubble one, only forty two could be pushed onto a collision course with the enemy. Gravity engines fired briefly then flux projectors wrapped each in a field that shrank the rock to a dimensionless point.

  Only the crew of one of the cruisers appeared to detect the incoming missiles. The warship changed course abruptly and disappeared as it entered the adjoining subspace bubble. Bazza smiled gr
imly; he did not think the crew had deliberately re-entered subspace.

  The other four warships were hit almost simultaneously by seven or eight flux meteoroids. They crumpled and exploded as the point singularities drilled through the vessels creating tunnels of intense gravity which flattened bulkheads and caused battery stores, weapons arsenals and engines to explode.

  With a corridor of normal space now connecting Fair Isles with the rest of the cosmos, communications resumed with the two squadrons outside the defensive dodecahedron.

  “Squadron A reporting,” came the first call from outside. “No fleeing vessels, so far, Commander.

  “Good, but stay alert,” said Bazza. “We are moving onto Bubble 3.”

  During the rest of the morning, Fair Isles central time, another six bubbles were deflated. After two days in the void unable to navigate or escape, the crews of the ships were confused and despondent. The suddenness of the assaults, once the subspace had cleared, caught the imperial officers by surprise. Thirty vessels were destroyed completely, including two battleships, only three cruisers escaped. They went running for the gateway at Marylebone. Then a Nemesis class battleship emerged from Bubble 12.

  +

  Vice Admiral Tim Bartz swivelled excitedly in his chair. For the past thirty minutes the crew throughout the ship had been watching a small circle of light on the forward view screen growing larger and larger.

  “Defensive screens up,” ordered Bartz. “Remember I want sit reps as soon as we emerge. Ion cannon fully charged! We must assume they’ll be waiting for us.”

  “Passing through an inverse flux field,” reported Bonnie Blackheart, sitting in the head of astronavigation’s chair.

  “Entering normal space, on a return course,” said one of the navigators.

  At least we’re pointing the right way, thought Bartz, but where’s the welcoming committee?

  “Guardian vessels in sectors Red 2 and Blue 6 but none within a million kilometres,” said one of the officers on the weapons desk.

  “Tactical, which group do we attack?” demanded Bartz, determined to defeat the Guardian ships.

  +

  “Squadron B, under attack,” said the leader. “A battleship, it came out of Bubble 12. It’s accelerating towards us.”

  “Defence plan 2,” said Commander Foster over the comms link. “Deploy flux and gravity mines and get into clusters. If you station yourself around Bubble 8, the enemy might choose a direct course.”

  “Putting them above Bubble 11. Understood, Sir.”

  +

  “The enemy vessels are grouping at Red zone 4,” said one of the tactical officers

  “They’ve seeded mines ahead, sir,” said another.

  “Extend the defence field,” ordered Bartz. “Are we still out of weapons range?”

  “Yes, Sir, but they’ll be within range of our ion cannon within 90 seconds.”

  “Straight ahead, then,” ordered Bartz anticipating slaughter.

  Although, he was heading towards a flotilla of forty or more ships, they were no match for his Nemesis class battleship. At close range, his ion cannon could cut through their screens even if they were reinforced by being overlapped. In any case, a few anti-matter missiles would soon break up their ship clusters. Meanwhile there was nothing they could do to prevent his kilometre long warship prevailing. They were like midges trying to stop an elephant.

  “Sir, if I might have a word,” said Bonnie Blackheart, now standing at Bartz elbow.

  The UFOologist had earned a lot of Bartz respect in a very short time. He swivelled his seat to face her.

  “Sir, my team have been mapping the subspace fields, like the one we were stuck in. They appear to be centred on the vertices of a Platonic solid.”

  Miss Blackheart offered up her pad which showed a large dodecahedron. The battleship was flying around the solid’s equator.

  “This is all a bit academic, Blackheart,” said Bartz. “We’re in the middle of a battle here.”

  “I only mention it because the field that should be directly ahead is missing. It could be a trap.”

  The image on screen of the UFOologist’s pad rotated to reveal a three sided hole through which Bartz could see the planet of Fair Isle.

  “Anything could be in that gap,” said Miss Blackheart. “Because of the subspace spheres either side, we wouldn’t know until we were over the hole.”

  “How far away are we?” said Bartz feeling he was about to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

  “Ten seconds.”

  “Helm, Evasive pattern delta, nose up 30 degrees, full thrust. Sensors and Tactical, full sweep to port. Retract all screens and brace for impact.”

  The officers on the Command Deck looked confused but their military discipline ensured they all obeyed the Vice Admiral’s orders.

  “Sit rep,” barked Bartz.

  There was a chorus of “nothing” around the deck. Then, as the battleship moved into the volume of space that had been above Bubble 11 before it was deflated, alarms sounded all over.

  “Gravity engines firing.”

  “Mass detector anomalies.”

  “Possible singularity missiles.”

  “Calculating trajectories…”

  A collision course warning bell sounded.

  Even though it had some of the most powerful engines ever built, turning Battleship Kraken was an arduous task. The sheer mass of the kilometre long vessel meant it could take more than five minutes to turn through 90 degrees.

  “Fire port thrusters,” shouted Bartz at his Helm Officer. “All of them. Get us up and away from here.”

  Battleship Kraken shuddered and half a second later there was the sound of bending metal and explosions.

  “Damage Control report,” shouted the Vice Admiral.

  “Two hits, mid-ships, sir. We’re still operational for combat though our stern screens are down.

  “Engineering, get those screens back up.”

  The collision course warning bell sounded again.

  +

  The Fair Isle force of Squadron B monitored the enemy’s desperate manoeuvres.

  “Damn Einstein’s eyes, they anticipated our attack,” said the Squadron Leader.

  “We hit the battleship twice, that’s a good result,” said Bazza consulting his strategy board. “Squadron leader, follow the enemy. It looks like their rear screens are down. Hit it with everything you’ve got.”

  Bazza could see the behemoth of a warship slowly turning to escape the system. It was beginning to accelerate. Weapons officers in Squadron B were trying to target the fleeing ship with some more flux meteorites. However, the giant battleship was now aware of the missiles and was continually changing course and accelerating. Within a minute the enemy would be travelling too fast to be caught by the rock filled singularities.

  Forty Guardian ships more than matched the enemy’s acceleration and followed behind rapidly catching up. On Bazza’s strategy board, a series of symbols scrolled next to the retreating battleship. The enemy was taking countermeasures.

  +

  “Launching gravity mines and decoys,” said a tactical officer on the command deck of the Imperial Battleship Kraken.

  The rear view being shown on the vid screen showed the guardian ships travelling in waves of five. The menacing pentagon stars were getting closer.

  “They are in range of our rear cannon,” said weapons.

  “Fire,” ordered Bartz. “Blow the bastards to bits.”

  An ion beam lashed out but failed to penetrate the guardian vessels’ overlapped defence screens. The rear guns had not been upgraded and were not as powerful as those in the ships prow. That was a big mistake to assume we’d never be on the run, thought Bartz

  “They’ve launched missiles,” said someone on the deck.

  “Engineering, where are my screens?” bellowed Bartz now getting seriously worried.

  “Five minutes, sir.”

  “That’s five minutes we haven’t go
t. Get those defence screens up now.”

  A rash of erupting lights scattered across the vid screen as the battleship’s mines exploded behind them. The officers on the command deck cheered. The shouts of joy were chocked back as the pursuing Guardian ships flew through the debris fields apparently unharmed.

  “Incoming anti-matter missiles.”

  “Impact in five seconds.”

  “Where are those bloody screens?” shouted Bartz.

  The rear view vid screen went blank and there was the sound of distant explosions.

  “Rear screens back on, sir,” said an engineer.

  “A bit late,” said Miss Blackheart. “We should go to hyper flight, sir, as soon as possible.”

  Vice Admiral Tim Bartz looked around the deck in dismay. I have failed you, my Lord.

  +

  Commander Foster looked at his strategy board. The retreating battleship had been hit but not badly wounded. The giant warship’s engines were intact and it was accelerating to a point where it could flip to the Upper Realm. An intelligence officer sent Bazza a note saying the vessel had been identified as Battleship Kraken, one of the two lead ships for the invasion. Good, he thought, less chance of the stragglers getting organised while we mop up.

  “Well done, Bazza,” said Suxie Wong from her headquarters on the planet below. “Just to remind you Bubble 8 is about to deflate. Squadron A are standing by.”

  Bazza, gritted his teeth but managed a smile. There were arduous hours ahead but they had won the battle. The outcome of the war, though, was far from settled.

  Chapter 3: Garth’s Mission

  Colonel Garth was only 61 gateways away from old Earth. He sat in the cabin of Imperial Valiant, controlling the portals for a fifty strong fleet of warships. Garth’s mission was to conquer the cradle of humanity.

  Garth had mixed emotions. He was proud the Brood King had given him a assignment of “utmost importance,” but he could not overcome the feeling he had been banished from court. In his previous life, Garth had always been ambivalent about allegiance. As the Emperor’s enforcer he had outwardly shown unswerving loyalty to his master. Inwardly, he remained a cold calculating opportunist, content to play a long game. Garth’s ruthlessness had earned him a place at the Emperor’s right hand and he had carte blanche to do what he liked. A year before, his loyalty had been tested when the Emperor showed he was willing to sacrifice Garth. The King had initiated a self-destruct program on the flag ship Orion during the Battle of Chimera One. His royal personage had been running away from a tiny alien ship. Garth despised the Emperor and was only waiting for a moment when he could depose the coward.