Hawk Seven (Flight of the Hawk)

by Little, Robert

  Commander Jarvis grinned and said, “Well then, it should be no surprise to you if Chief Kana accidentally meets up with the Netherlands’ Blue Magoo, as we call him, or her.

  I grinned in anticipation, while Nastya looked on, her face a study in contradictions. It occurred to me that she may have wanted to spend this time alone with me, and that was another revelation. I was getting bombarded with the things.

  Nastya stepped forward and said, “Sir, I have been acting as Lt. Padilla’s guide, and if he is going to be spending what I know will be a long time with the crews, we need to feed him.” Commander Jarvis said, “By all means Lieutenant, let’s make sure he gets fed. By the way, Lieutenant?” He had received an alert on his pad and was now looking at me, “I’ve received word that your crew mates will be here within thirty minutes. I’ll make sure to get them up to our mess hall promptly.”

  I thanked him a little breathlessly and before anyone else could interrupt us Nastya said, “Lieutenant, if you’ll come with me?” I nodded and she guided my elbow firmly away from the growing crowd. I felt intensely conspicuous, thinking that everyone was looking at me. However, on further speculation, they – the men – were more probably looking at Nastya, who looked very good in a uniform. In fact, she looked very good in a gi, but she could have been either a stick or a tub in a gi, and who could have known which? Well, the cat was out of the bag now – she was most wonderfully neither.

  She led me up and forward to the officer’s mess. I noted that a large table had already been set up for five people. I looked at the table and then at Nastya and she grinned. “Well, yes, I’m somewhat adept at planning on the run.” I said, “I’ve heard of those things.” She looked at me a little uncertainly and asked, “You’ve heard of what?” I said, “Plans.” She laughed and said, “Anyone who could command twelve craft on repeated attack runs against a formidable foe has to be able to plan.”

  I smiled ruefully and said, “Well, you’re in for a surprise. ETech4 Carolyn spent a few minutes setting up new software that allowed us to run all twelve Hawks with one pilot. She really is amazing. We were able to behave as if we were one single vessel. I could target separate enemy craft and dictate how many missiles went where, and it was as easy, or even easier, than if we were all aboard one single ship.”

  Nastya made a note and caught me looking. She smiled ruefully, “I’m sorry, but I want to make sure that all the right questions get asked. You and your crews are heading away from the war zone, but we’re heading into it, and we want our crews to be as well informed as is humanly possible.”

  She looked at me intently for just a moment, then added, “Lieutenant Padilla. Robert. You would have been invited to speak to our crews no matter what, but I invited you here tonight, because I wanted to, well, to get to know you.” She continued to look into my eyes, which were looking right back. I said, “Truth to tell, I would have come, no matter who invited me, but I also want to get to know you. Very much.”

  She blushed, surprising me, the blush king of my generation. She looked down at her lap for a brief moment, and then looked back up. She said one, wonderful word, “Perfect.”

  We were just getting served when Elian, Carolyn and the chief entered, looking around questioningly. I stood and waved them over, although in a nearly empty hall, they would probably been able to find us without my visual aids. Nastya stood as well and I watched Elian’s face carefully, looking for his reaction. He grinned hugely.

  I introduced everyone and we quickly got down to the business at hand, eating a quick supper before the inquisition. Between bites I asked Carolyn, “Did you bring, um, any documentation?” She smiled and held up her pad. Elian said, “She’s probably got every chart, mission briefing and after-action report from every one of our missions, all tucked away neatly.”

  Nastya looked in appreciation at Carolyn and asked, “May I call you Carolyn?” Carolyn nodded and Nastya continued, “I’ve been hearing very high praise about you from Lieutenant Padilla. I’m delighted that the three of you could join us tonight. As I explained to Lieutenant Padilla, the entire ship is excited to be able to pick your minds tonight. They want to get a feel for the enemy, and nobody else in all the federation has that information, save for you four.”

  She turned to the chief and said, “Master Chief, as you are no doubt aware, your reputation precedes you. Actually, your reputations. I believe that Commander Jarvis, our senior attack squadron commander wants to introduce you to one of our crew, who is, I am told, the Blue Magoo of the Netherlands. Additionally, I’m sure that you will be asked many questions concerning your preparation for those missions, as well as the missions themselves.”

  Finally, she turned to Elian, “Lieutenant, I understand that in addition to being quite a good navigator, you are an excellent pilot as well.” Carolyn giggled and the chief grinned, but they remained quiet, forcing Elian to answer. “I see that Robert has been talking out of turn. Actually, I couldn’t have accomplished that highly difficult mission without the expert navigational skills of ETech4 Carolyn.”

  Nastya said, with an absolutely straight face, “And, Lieutenant, I understand that a medal was involved?” Elian grinned like a Cheshire cat and answered, “Yes Lieutenant, the medal ceremony followed immediately upon the successful completion of that mission.”

  I was barely able to restrain my laughter, but managed to contain my mirth. Nastya asked, “And, Lieutenant, has subsequent examination of the relative value of that medal led you to believe that it was worth the inherent risks of such a dangerous mission?” I could no longer contain myself and laughed, along with everyone else at the table.

  For the first time in a very long while, Elian had met his match. When the laughter died down, Elian said, with evident dignity, “Lieutenant, that medal was worth ten, no, a hundred missions into the depths of hell.” I started to laugh again, but realized suddenly that Elian was serious. I looked at Carolyn and realized that she was hearing the same thing I was. She looked at Elian sideways and a small, slightly wondering smile grew slowly on her lips. This was very interesting indeed.

  We still had a few minutes before we had to leave for the auditorium, so we spent it in preparation. I would act as moderator and turn over the podium to my three crewmates, as the circumstances demanded.

  Nastya’s pad beeped and she looked at it briefly, then said, “It’s show time.” We stood up and the chief hustled to the hatch to open it for us. I said, somberly, “Thanks, Jeeves.” He responded quickly. In a frail, quavering voice he asked, “Will that be all, sir?” I laughed at his very accurate depiction of The Ancient Butler.

  We descended quickly down and aft toward the stern. With a couple of minutes to spare we went through another hatch and entered a large flight deck. My first impression was that it was packed to the rafters with men and women in uniform. My second impression was that it was very tightly packed.

  We found a table on a raised dais, with four chairs, each one labeled with one of our names. These people were very organized indeed. We were seated and an admiral stepped up on the dais in front of the table. An officer called out “Attention on deck!” The admiral said, “As you were, gentlemen.”

  It took a moment for everyone to get settled. In that period of time, the admiral looked expectantly back at Nastya. She seemed able to read his expression, for she said, “Sir, everyone has been notified, and we’ve got representatives from every ship that came forward with us.” The admiral nodded his head and turned back.

  “We’ve got the great good fortune to have with us tonight one of the crews of Attack Squadron 513. In fact, as you’ll see, this is the crew that literally reinvented the Hawk. They, well, I’ll let them tell the story.” With that, the admiral stepped off the dais and took a seat in the front row. He smiled up at us and nodded his head. We were on.

  I stood and walked over to the podium. I asked, “Can I see a show of hands of all the fighter crews?” About one quarter of the people in the room raised their
hands. I said, “Since there are so many pilots and navigators present, we’ll use words of no more than two syllables.” There was a surprised burst of laughter. I waited until it died down and then asked, “How many of you are support personnel?” Another quarter raised their hands. I smiled and said, “OK, for you folks, we’ll provide large, color diagrams.” More laughter ensued. I looked up at the rows of people and asked, “I understand that we have some crews from other ships. Will you please identify yourselves?” One by one, representatives from six other ships stood and called out their ships names, each one eliciting cheers and not a few good-natured cat calls.

  I looked at them for a moment, and then began. “The Auxiliary Carrier Essex was entering its third month of a six month mission, crossing the Void, a large, empty expanse measuring some ten light years by six by four. A destroyer, the Horsham was out on our left flank, and reported an incursion of a large number of inbound fighter-sized craft, traveling at a very high velocity and in a formation that was clearly hostile. The Horsham turned back towards our fleet and was shortly thereafter taken under energy fire from the fighters. She was lost with all hands in approximately four minutes time.”

  I continued without pause, “The Essex and her companion carrier the Invictus launched thirty-six Dash 6 fighters. They were without missiles, due to having just returned from exercises. The two groups of fighters interpenetrated and within five minutes, two of the enemy and fifteen Dash 6’s had been destroyed.”

  “Following upon the heels of the incursion, a second wave of enemy fighters joined the attack. The two groups greatly outnumbered our fighters and possessed energy weapons equal to approximately a thirty to thirty five centimeter laser. As you know, the Dash 6 utilizes a twenty-five centimeter weapon, and our destroyers have thirty-five centimeter lasers. In the ensuing battle, one destroyer was badly crippled and was ordered out of the fight. Five other destroyers were destroyed outright, taking with them five additional enemy fighters.”

  I took a sip of water and continued, “If the enemy had been able to sustain its attack, it could have forced its way clear through our defenses and attacked the carriers directly. As it was, the enemy fighters withdrew at literally the last minute. We believe – believed – and later analysis confirmed, that they had traveled an extremely long distance and had exhausted their energy or other systems. That was the only reason that the Essex and her sister carrier were not destroyed.”

  “In the following two days more than half of all our fighters were knocked out. In later engagements we utilized missiles, but the enemy adapted almost instantly to them, demonstrating that they were aware of this technology. The missiles we were using – the Dash 12 - were not very much better at killing the enemy fighters than our energy weapons.”

  “During this period, a shipment of four Hawks was discovered in the cargo of the Essex. Within two days one of them was outfitted with four extra mag bottles and her two lasers were replaced with thirty-five centimeter versions. For those of you who don’t know of the Hawk, it was a front line attack craft and served in various configurations and versions for well over a century. The ones found on the Essex were approximately sixty years old. It was an extremely expensive craft to build, but was capable of landing ten infantry in powered armor on a contested planetary surface, and could survive direct hits from heavy lasers.”

  I turned to the side slightly and pointed at the chief, “For a description of the modifications to the Hawk, I’m going to turn to Master Chief Kana, who oversaw all the work done on that first Hawk.”

  The chief stood and walked over to the podium. In a calm voice, he described the changes made to the craft, even detailing the modules we’d replaced. He went on to describe our first test run, its extraordinary acceleration and it’s near invisibility to any active sensors. He concluded by describing our discovery of the methods by which the enemy had been able to locate our fleet, and the steps we’d taken to eliminate that radiation.

  He finished and I introduced Elian, who described our first run, the launch of the Mark 65 and the results that ensued. The room became very quiet. Elian continued and finished with a description of the additional modifications we subsequently made, and the reasons for them. Several times during our presentation one or more people raised their hands, but the admiral ordered, “Save your questions for the end.” That was that.

  Carolyn had asked me not to ask her to speak, and I assented. Public speaking is not for everyone.

  We finally got to the last attack run, its results and the subsequent discovery that the Essex had been destroyed.

  We wound up our presentation and the admiral got up. Standing in place at his seat he said, “Now”, and sat back down. He was a man of few words, but I sensed a strong intellect and a very practical determination to complete his mission.

  A forest of hands went up and I grinned ruefully. Commander Jarvis took over the task of selecting which hands were to be acknowledged. The first was from a fighter pilot who wanted to know about the bugs. I pointed to Elian but he grinned and said, “Oh no, Lieutenant Padilla, you get to answer ‘pilot’ questions, and I get to answer ‘navigator’ questions.” There were some quiet chuckles, but this was a serious room tonight.

  I described the capabilities of the bug fighter, and didn’t forget to state that we had readings on four different types. I described them in as much detail as possible. I used pilot jargon, but I was imparting pilot-specific information.

  When I finished, the questioner, a female Dash 4 pilot, asked a follow up question about the capabilities of the bug pilots. I thought for a moment and said, “They don’t make mistakes. Their targeting systems are excellent, although their general level of technology is slightly cruder than ours. On our first mission to a bug mother ship, their outer perimeter fighters remained out for fifteen hours. We subsequently learned that they knew we were in the vicinity, but not exactly where. All those modifications to your mag bottles and engines are a direct result of the initial work done by Etech4 Carolyn. Believe me that your lives depend on performing those modifications absolutely perfectly. Ninety five percent perfect gets you killed.” I paused, and said again, “Killed.”

  We fielded question after question and I could sense a change in the room, from a dread of the unknown, to an almost eagerness to get on with the job.

  Finally, the admiral stood up and said to the four of us, “I know that your time is limited, but this command would benefit greatly from further contact, in greater detail. I’ll be in communication with your commanding officer. I understand that some of your Hawk people are highly experienced. What I would like to see would be a series of presentations showing how the bugs attack and defend, and most especially, how to blow the bastards up.”

  The admiral turned to Commander Jarvis and said, “Commander, I’ll turn this over to you. Please keep me informed.” With that an aide shouted, “Ten hut!” and the room jumped to its collective feet. The admiral acknowledged them and walked quickly to the nearest hatch.

  Nastya stood and gestured to us to follow her. We left rather quickly and followed her up an endless series of decks and corridors, ending up at a hatch with a marine in attendance. She nodded to him and he opened it. Inside, we found another large space, this one a mess hall. It was filling up with the same flight crews who had been sitting in the auditorium with us just moments before.

  We instantly became the center of focus of everyone in the room. The atmosphere was more relaxed and informal, but served the same purpose as before. The questions revolved around the relative impotence of the Dash 6, and the possible ability of the renovated Dash 4. I asked about acceleration, and what happened if the Dash 4 had to accelerate at max while simultaneously targeting and shooting its laser. Nobody knew the answer to that question. I said, “You had better learn the answer to that question here, because not knowing it will kill you there.”

  I turned and found Commander Jarvis had been standing near me, listening. He said, “Lieutenant, we�
��ll initiate those tests first thing tomorrow. Is there anything else you can tell my fighter pilots that will help them?” I looked at Elian and he nodded. He said, “Yes. First, they adapt quickly to new tactics. I believe, hell, we all believe that these beings, whatever they are, are very knowledgeable about and accustomed to warfare. They have one huge mother ship, surrounded by military craft. It’s not a fleet, it’s more like a colonization effort. They have no freighters, no cargo ships, no passenger liners, no tourist barges. Their tendency is to attack, but if you can get them confused, get them on the defensive you’ll do much better. Said in another way, you won’t get killed. Much. Do not think that your fleet can withstand a major attack by their fighters and destroyers. And anything they do, will be done full tilt. The only success we enjoyed was when we took the fight to them. I do not know how the Essex was finally located, but they sent out well over a dozen destroyers to look for us, acting as tenders for approximately ten fighters each. One of those groups must have located our ship without being sighted. One important point: they do not seem to have discovered FTL. We took great pains not to jump anywhere near them. I’d guess that the Essex just ran out of time, or was hit bad enough right at the outset to make that impossible.”