CONTACT AND CONFLICT. ALIENS & HUMANS.: Book One in the Space Fleet Sagas

by Don Foxe

  

  Book One in the Space Fleet Sagas

  PT-109, John F. Kennedy

  DON FOXE

  Copyright © 2017 don foxe

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Stock images are used for illustrative purposes only.

  Some images from pixabay.com. Any people depicted in stock imagery are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

  Author back cover photo by Abri Kruger Photography, South Africa.

  ISBN: 9780998804446 (Second Edition)

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2017903778

  (First Edition)

  First Edition: 10/18/2016

  Second Edition: 8/10/2017

  This first one is for Sarah -

  wife and enabler.

  Listener, critic, cheerleader, and partner.

  (Yes, I know militaries use metrics, even U.S. military. For those who prefer the more “correct” metric method . . . maybe two versions for future books?)

  This second edition is important in that the original release was rushed, resulting in less-than-best editing and rewriting. While the original received excellent reviews, and the story and characters have not changed, I hope the quality of the writing helps others enjoy the book without tripping over previous flaws. DF

  PART 1

  Test Flight

  of the 109

  PRELIM

  “Captain of the Osperantue civilian cruise ship, this is Space Patrol and Services, do you copy?”

  “I hear you Space Patrol. Thank you for helping.” The voice strained. Not panicked, but clearly under pressure.

  “Captain, direct all deflector power to cover your rear sphere. My patrol ships will use their repulser/retrieval beams to protect your forward sphere. As soon as you escape the atmosphere, route all power to your engines. Outrunning the enemy ships to the wormhole gate will be your only option.”

  “That much power could damage my engines,” the cruise ship captain replied.

  “Anything less and you, and all of your passengers are dead. Do you understand, Captain?”

  “Yes.” The answer hesitant.

  The SPS commander turned his attention to his ships.

  “Space Patrol vessels assisting the cruise ship, be prepared to break off and disperse as soon as the cruise ship escapes the atmosphere and engages space-drive engines. Free of the planet’s gravity, the ship will outdistance you quickly.”

  “Commander, I believe I speak for the others,” Captain Tanitsch responded across the same mix of channels. “We will regroup and cover the ship’s escape.”

  For a single breath the fleet commander considered ordering his patrol ships to abandon the cruise ship and attempt to evade the enemy vessels. If he were there, instead of in the command center, he would make the same decision as Tanitsch.

  “Understood, Captain,” he replied. “It is an honor to command the officers and crews of Patrol and Services. Each of you must do what you consider best, but do not throw your lives away. When you can offer no more help, get out. Use the wormhole if possible. Return to the surface and hide if necessary. We must hold out, hold on, and fight the invaders until help arrives.”

  Red and green lights flashed across the command center’s consoles. The patrol captains tapping emergency responder signals in a centuries-old tradition of a silent hurrah.

  Six others staffed the command center with the commander and Pánz, the communications specialist. Exhausted, worried, angry, and curious, the six left stations now useless in the face of planet-wide incursions to watch the next few minutes play out. Hope flew with the cruise ship carrying twice the maximum number of bodies, less than half the standard crew, and the phalanx of rescue and recovery ships.

  “The Cygnant is gone,” Pánz called. “The remaining seven ships continue to rotate and pace the cruise ship. More enemy ships are converging.”

  Precious minutes swept by in slow motion. The relativity of time experienced by the frozen moment and the action racing forward. Everyone watched the holo-display icons. A small group of ships plowing into dozens, no, scores, of enemy vessels. One huge mass, the cruise ship, steadily moving forward and up.

  “The Spinnaker and Captain Tanitsch are gone,” the coms operator said. The catch in her voice for the lost crew, and the loss of the last SPS vessel with a laser canon. “The cruise ship no longer has rear protection. We have no ships available with offensive weapons.”

  Time. The added layers of forcefield deflected lasers targeting the large trailing sphere. The repulsers from the patrol ships spinning around the forward command sphere stopped most incoming blasts, and pushed enemy spacecraft aside.

  “Finally!” the Commander shouted. Repressed anxiety released with the pronouncement. “They’ve routed all power to engines. The cruise ship is leaving our people behind. They have a chance.”

  “Two more patrol ships destroyed,” Pánz reported, smearing the potential for hope with the pain of lost friends. “The five remaining are setting a diamond pattern behind the ship. Repulsers at full. They’ve built a wall, but it cannot last long.”

  “Doesn’t need to,” the Commander responded. “Even if some of the enemy ships go around the beams, the added distance will provide time for the captain of the cruise ship to increase his lead.”

  The distances in space, even at the tremendous speeds generated by modern power plants, required time to cover. Time in which the smaller attacking spaceships would continue their pursuit. Time for any number of mechanical breakdowns to slow the escaping civilian craft filled with innocents. Time spent anxiously watching events hundreds of thousands of miles away play out.

  “The five SFSD ships are scattering. Enemy ships are separating. Some continue to chase the cruise ship, others in pursuit of our patrol boats, and some returning toward the planet,” Pánz reported.

  If she expected a response from the commander, it never came. All any of them could do now was watch.

  Hours passed. The commander and communications specialist the only two remaining at headquarters. The others gone to find family and shelter. No icons for SPS ships remained on the holo-board. They either made it back to the surface, or not.

  “Wormhole gate activity,” coms called. “A vessel is exiting. Commander, it’s a shovel-head design. A battle cruiser is entering the system. Do you think they’ve come to help?”

  “Have they made contact?”

  “With us, no. But I am receiving a call directed at the cruise ship.”

  Her eyes closed, and her head dropped. With resignation dripping from each words, she told him, “A computer-generated message from the battle cruiser ordered the Osperantue ship to stop engines or be fired upon. They are with the invaders.”

  “It doesn’t appear the captain plans on obeying that order,” the commander said, scanning the tactical displays. He watched the holo-icons representing the two space craft at the edge of the star system.

  The wormhole
gate and the planet were at the shortest distance from one another in centuries. The edge of the system proximal enough for telemetry to provide information and details in near-real time.

  “He’s going to ram the battle cruiser,” the coms operator said.

  The commander did not respond, keeping his attention on the action taking place displayed in numbers and dots.

  “Do it,” he whispered. “Make them react,” he added. The three knuckles on both hands turning white.

  “The battleship dove,” Pánz yelled. “The cruise ship is passing over the top. They entered the gate. They made it. They made it!”

  Two exhausted people buoyed by a small, but significant victory.

  The commander patted Pánz on her shoulder and said, “Find your family. Find a place to hide. Offer resistance when and if you can. All we can do now is survive and wait for help.”

  Chapter 1

  Cooper stood alone and aloof, paying no attention to the activity on his side of the viewing platform’s panoramic windows. He focused on the vista behind the translucent wall. His interest taken by the beehive of a massive dry-dock attached to EMS2; the United Earth’s orbital Earth-Moon Space Station.

  EMS2 functioned as the operational headquarters of Space Fleet, in conjunction with fleet engineering, the division tasked with the construction of spaceships. The fixed-station platform served as a military base, location for several science projects, and village for the thousands who lived and worked aboard. It provided exterior piers for ships and shuttles. On either side of the central hub, two massive spheroidal shipyards extended into open space.

  He watched workers transfer cargo to a ship floating in the enclosed space above the dockyard’s translucent basin. Movement around the vessel would cause it to shudder. Tiny tremors only he noticed.

  The vessel represented a harbinger of hope for a planet striving to unite its population. The first to launch in a forthcoming fleet of military spaceships. Ships able to travel to distant stars and capable of protecting Earth from anyone who might travel to ours. She was a battle-worthy craft, combining innovations reverse-engineered from a spaceship discovered on Mars with the best in current technology.

  Fully automated, under the direction of an Artificial Intelligence, if required. Capable of berthing a crew of eighty-six when fully staffed.

  Two very different power systems produced the energy for flight. The primary plasma-fusion drive provided power for flight requirements needed for maneuvers as simple as docking, to performance similar to jets or shuttlecraft. This engine also created the energy for the ship to reach speeds up to 250,000mph in space.

  A more exotic design empowered the second drive-source plant. Engineers positioned multiple lasers and then discharged their beams onto a very special crystal. When activated, the laser-crystal array created a space-time bubble that encircled and propelled the vessel through folded space. Space-fold travel meant reaching, and then returning, from previously improbable distances, would take days instead of decades.

  Standing and staring through the composite glass, Captain Cooper appeared a man adrift in reflection, but his thoughts were as ordered and no-nonsense as he. He silently performed his pre-flight routine. Engaged in his mental checklist, he barely noticed when a young woman stopped beside him. Having no interest in starting a conversation, he did not acknowledge her. When she did not move on, he switched his attention from the ship to the woman. He gave a simple quarter turn of his head, and a shift of his eyes; a wordless recognition of her presence, and a cursory inspection.

  Slender, pretty, strawberry blonde, with deep blue eyes. Her eyes seemed darker because of her light complexion. Mid-twenties, but freckles across her cheeks made her appear younger. She wore a black leather jacket over a white t-shirt, jeans, and vintage Adidas tennis shoes. Either a civilian or off-duty military. When she spoke, her subject surprised him.

  “Laser cannon on top, another on the bottom. Both operated manually, or via computer-targeting software. A railgun, with its own power source, concealed within the ship’s keel. It descends for action, allowing the intense heat created by the weapon to dissipate into space. The gun’s primary load is projectiles, formally called kinetic energy penetrators or KEP.”

  Cooper gave her his complete attention. Whoever she might be, she knew his ship.“The KEP also designated LRP, for Long-Rod Penetrator, is a type of ammunition designed to penetrate armor.” She continued to stare at the ship, giving no cue her recitation had anything to do with him.

  “Like a bullet, this ammunition does not contain explosives. The velocity generated when fired by a railgun allows the projectile to penetrate its target. The force created at contact can demolish a building. Gunners call them rods, because that is exactly what they are. Dense hybrid-metal bars.”

  She returned the quarter head-turn he had given her. Her eyes showed no recognition. She appraised him in the same manner he appraised his ship.

  “The ship carries non-nuclear electromagnetic pulse shells,” she said. “These also fired by the railgun, delivering a weapon-generated electromagnetic pulse on impact. The NNEMP load capabilities include disruption of electrical and magnetic fields, as well as delivering incredible destructive force. Military armorers nicknamed the shells nymphs.” Cooper appreciated nicknames.

  “She carries twenty-four torpedoes with mixed loads, including tactical-nuclear. Smart-homing packages allow them to find and lock onto fixed or moving objectives. Designated as torpedoes, instead of missiles, because of size and propulsion. These weapons, and her principal duty to patrol the solar system, provided the genesis for naming the ship after the PT-boats used by the former United States of America in the Pacific theater during World War II.”

  She returned her stern gaze to the docked ship and said, “Designation Space Fleet Patrol Torpedo Class Number One-Oh-Nine. The SFPT-109, John F. Kennedy. Built to fight and designed to explore. The John F. Kennedy is part warship and part science project.”

  Cooper, so intrigued in the woman’s narrative, he was unaware someone else joined them.

  “Fifty-years in the making.”

  Captain Cooper snapped to attention and threw a salute the moment he heard the voice of Admiral Patterson, Command Leader of the United Earth’s Space Fleet. He did not flinch, but felt embarrassed someone entered his personal space unnoticed. The result of becoming entrenched in the other woman’s rendition.

  “At ease,” said the Admiral, responding with a semi-salute.

  “Fifty years ago, the Mars mission discovered a hidden space ship and a massive support hangar,” the Admiral said. “We may never know who left it there, or why, but they were smart enough to leave clues that allowed us to unravel many of their secrets. Eventually we reverse-engineered the science of space flight. Thirty years ago the Space Rangers Project produced exceptional graduates, like you. Now the two pieces come together and humans are heading to the stars. Mind-blowing, wouldn’t you say?”

  Daniel Marcel Cooper looked in his late twenties, or possibly early thirties. At six-foot-one, and one-ninety, you might not consider him formidable. Until you witnessed him in action. He was lean muscle, and not much body fat. With brown hair, a bit long for military standards, and brown eyes dark to nearly black. He could look at you, through you, or past you without you knowing which. Until he looked hard at you. Then you found yourself in a sniper’s eyes.

  He towered over the five-foot-four-inch, one-thirty, Patterson. He was actually older than the fifty-two-year-old Admiral of Space Fleet.

  “Yes, ma’am. Mind-blowing.”

  The Admiral dropped her head for a tick of time and smiled.

  “The first time I met you, I was fresh out of Academy, assigned to Naval Intelligence in Tampa. You were going through the pre-training requirements before entering Naval Flight School. Tall, handsome, and mysterious. A man of few words. Thirty years later, and I consider you just as mysterious.”

  “Not tall and handsome?”

  “
Yes, but I’m an Admiral, a wife, a mother, and soon a grandmother, so I’m no longer allowed to comment on such matters.” The smile disappeared, and a more somber Naval Officer continued. “Captain Cooper, you have two weeks to make sure the SF PT-109 is everything promised. Shake her down. Run her through every scenario you can think of. Test every system, and return her whole. You’ve been the lead test pilot on every space-worthy ship we’ve constructed over the past two decades. If you find flaws, bring her back, and let’s get them fixed. If she’s ready, bring her back, load her up, and begin on-board training of her crew. Once the ship, the crew, and the captain have proven they can handle the job, then we begin the mission. Space Fleet will have a ship able to patrol and protect our solar system, and a means to explore deep space. Hopefully, one day to make contact with other worlds.”

  “I’m looking forward to my time with Kennedy,” Cooper replied, his eyes trailing over the ship from stern to forward tip. His mind ticking off the floors, levels, and compartments. He knew this ship better than any person he ever met, slept with, lived with, or loved.

  She represented regeneration and reinvigoration. He had twenty-plus years as a test pilot, and the solitary life he built around his career suited him. One last test flight, then command of this ship and a full crew. Was he ready to give up his life for command of this ship? Was this his best opportunity to reach the stars?

  The strawberry blonde disappeared sometime between her final observation, and during the Admiral’s comments. He had not been aware of her arrival, and did not notice her departure. He was slipping.

  “Seems like your life has become one big alone, Coop,” Patterson remarked. “I can count your friends on one hand.” Holding up her left fist, she began lifting a finger with each name: “Me, Elie, Anton, Nathan,” and finally lifted the thumb adding, “Henry.”