A Deep Sleep (Valhalla Book 1)

by Tyler Totten

  “Very well.” Athena replied.

  “Distortion stable, engaging in three, two, one, engage.” Masters pushed the control for FTL forward 5 clicks. “Entering distortion, going to FTL.”

  “Normal space sensors offline, subspace sensors have come through the distortion.” Johnson informed Athena of the expected effects of transition to subspace.

  “We are superluminal at 5x light, sir.” Masters report was the final in a series that followed a transition to subspace. The trip was short, with the Tripoli and her escorts covering the distance in 8 minutes.

  “Emergence!” Master called out over the alarms that rang out as Tripoli emerged from subspace.

  “Azov is firing, sir.” The bridge shook to give emphasis to Johnson’s statement. “Targeting from both cruisers, they haven’t fired yet.”

  “Heath?” Athena prompted.

  “Point defense is established and in full auto.”

  Athena flipped on her comm, already hooked into the FTL comm array.

  “Hornet squadron 4, let’s wake up Kirov.” Athena shut the comm link. From within the Oort Cloud, the last 5 gunboats fired up their reactors and engaged FTL. Instead of the more sedate 5x light of the Tripoli, squadron 4 went to max speed, 50x light. The gunboats leapt across the distance in a little more than 45 seconds. They emerged just aft of the suspected position of Kirov. The big ship, realizing she’d been made, came to life like a sleeping dragon.

  As the gunboats arrived aft of her, Kirov lashed out. A gunboat died almost instantly upon exit from FTL and Athena worried that the Kirov had more of her systems ready than NavInt suspected possible. The remaining four gunboats, however, continued inward, driving hard towards the maneuvering ship. Clearly her first shot had been one heck of a lucky shot. The squadron closed the short distance rapidly and each survivor fired three Mk-92Bs at the battlecruiser. Kirov corkscrewed wildly and her point defense reached out for the inbounds. From the range they were fired, Kirov had no real chance. Twelve Mk-92Bs achieved the correct range and detonated.

  The gunboats scattered, one last one being blotted out by a final missile salvo from the dying Kirov. From within the thermonuclear fires only the bow section emerged, spinning and leaking fluids into space. Athena saw no lifeboats.

  “Scratch one battlecruiser.” Johnson cried out.

  “And still three ships to go.” Athena needed them all to stay focused. “Lieutenant Heath, target Azov, all railguns. Daniels, comm the gunboats, formation echo. Tell Forth Worth she is go for the plan, smoke ‘em.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  The other three Hornet squadrons dropped into formation behind Tripoli. The three remaining escorts concentrated their fire on Tripoli, putting her new systems to the test. From around the circumference of the assault carrier, twelve large drones emerged, surging away from the ship and emitting confusing ECM and signatures that emulated the gunboats. They established a large formation around Tripoli. The two enemy cruisers switched their fire, dueling with the ghost gunboats. While the gunboats couldn’t fire back, they did contain small fusion reactors. Their reactors powered a small point defense laser that allowed them to attempt to engage a missile or two. When the enemy missiles closed, the drones carried several single-shot versions of the shipboard shotguns. To further complicate the enemy’s targeting, Tripoli continued to generate ECM jamming and ghost gunboat contacts. The Russian sensor operators and tactical officers were seeing nearly 30 gunboats that simply didn’t exist. Kashin fired a full salvo at a ghost squadron and saw over half the salvo be destroyed before reaching detonation range. They were rewarded with the destruction of two “gunboat” drones. The ghost gunboats from Tripoli remained, prompting them to firing an additional wave. Ognevoy seemed to realize that there were ghost images, but still knew there were real gunboats there as well. Her captain resorted to firing a railgun salvo at each collection of gunboats before engaging with missiles. All of this was taking time they didn’t have.

  Athena allowed the group to close to within 500,000km before she commed the gunboats tight on Tripoli’s stern.

  “Hornets, take them out.” She received a chorus of ‘yes sirs” and a few other less regulation comments. The fifteen gunboats emerged from their cover behind Tripoli and a squadron headed for each of the remaining escorts. Seeing the sudden emergence of even more gunboats from what seemed to be nowhere prompted the Russian crews to initially ignore them. As they pushed ahead, their drive signatures and targeting radars forced them to reconsider. Azov lashed out with a powerful microwave emitter. While the emitter was next to useless against a hardened ship like Tripoli, against the Hornets, it was the perfect weapon. Squadron 1, targeting Azov, lost two of their number to the emitter. Hornet 4 lost fusion containment for a brief millisecond and disappeared in a flash of light. Hornet 2 managed to avoid containment failure from the emitter, but the effects of Azov’s 6-barrel 155mm railgun topside turret ripped her into a dozen pieces. The other three gunboats continued to close.

  Aboard Tripoli, Athena held onto her command chair more tightly as CIC was rocked by a large explosion and after shudder.

  “Hull breach forward, decks C and D, frames 8 through 25 on the port side are open to space.” Called Master Chief Brown, Chief of the Boat (COB), over the comm from Damage Control I. DC parties are enroute. I’ll have more info for you then Captain.”

  “Keep me informed COB.” Athena responded.

  “Yes sir.” He said and closed the line.

  “Sir, Squadron Three has launched, target is Kashin.” Johnson reported.

  Athena looked more intently at the display, watching the twelve missiles separate from the four gunboats and drive towards the Russian destroyer. The powerful anti-missile ECM jammers came online to confuse the missiles, drones and decoys popped out of her hull and she tried to make wild evasive maneuvers. Her point defense proved surprisingly effective, taking down five of the inbounds. The decoys seduced another three off target and ECM burned out the seekers in two. The remaining two pressed on. One missile was winged by a shotgun burst and spun wildy out of control, detonating almost immediately as the missile determined that it had reached its closest point. The final missile continued on, through the inner point defense shield. Kashin surged her repulsors as the warhead detonated close aboard at just over 1 km. The ship staggered sideways and power died along her stern. Two of her four main thrusters ceased operation, slowing the ship’s acceleration. She began to lag in the group.

  “Missiles launched against Ognevoy too sir, sixteen this time.” Johnson interjected.

  Athena watched a similar story play out, with Ognevoy’s point defense at least as effective. Four missiles made it through the field of fire and detonated around the destroyer, bathing the ship in massive amounts of radiation. She was disadvantaged by the larger missile salvo, but she’d gotten in her licks too. Only three gunboats had survived, with one of those taking damage to her missile launchers, preventing the firing of two of her missiles. Otherwise, the squadron had launched a full salvo at the destroyer. The destroyer’s hull couldn’t take the pounding and she dropped thrust, quickly falling behind.

  “Ognevoy’s power levels are dropping and I’m reading indications of hull venting across her entire starboard side. There is also a substantial heat build-up in her starboard aft corner, indication of an internal fire. She’s out of the fight for a while sir.” Johnson stated.

  “Status on Azov.” Athena was still focused on the cruiser, Tripoli still bearing down on the relatively unwounded ship. The gunboats of the first squadron had expended their missile loads, making them useless against the tough ship. The puny 50mm railguns on the Hornets wouldn’t even make the Russian repulsors surge to stop those.

  “Sir,” Heath spoke up first. “Azov has not taken any damage from missiles and we have had limited success with our own railguns. We’ve also expended more than half of the missiles in our ready magazine.”

  “Azov is showing no outward signs of combat degra
dation sir. She has fired approximately a half of her own missile load, but that is substantially larger than our own.” Johnson reported.

  “Gunboats?” Athena asked.

  “We still have ten gunboats from squadron 1-3, plus the three survivors from squadron 4. They are currently decelerating from their run on Kirov. They’ll be available in two minutes sir.” Johnson responded. “Course change!”

  “Azov and the civvies are bending their course, we’re going to overshoot.” Johnson continued.

  “Maneuvering, stay with them.” Athena called out, checking the mission clock. “We’ve got to keep them on this evasive line for another few seconds.”

  “Trying sir, they’ve got the advantage here, we came in oblique and they are countering us. We’ll get real close in a minute here but then they’ll blow past us and move clear.” Masters said, still focusing hard on his controls, trying to bring Tripoli around to match the Russian’s turn.

  “Captian, need a hand?” Captain Weklar broke in over the comm. Fort Worth emerged from subspace nearly directly in front of the convoy, unleashing a salvo of six Mk-92Bs directly at the three civvies, two per ship. Since the ships had almost no point defenses, the missiles closed almost unopposed. Taking a page from Captain Unger’s playbook, Weklar had set the missiles to close to almost impact before detonating. Sevmorput was the first to die. With her better engines, she had surged ahead of the other two and now she paid the price. The first missile actually impacted the hull as it detonated, vaporizing most of the forward section, The second missile detonated just forward of her starboard drives, causing a violent explosion and inducing a sidespin in the now-dead aft section.

  Athena watched in shock as the Cormoran pulled up in a maneuver that must have taken a decade off the ship’s useful life, pulling g-forces that she doubted the inertial dampeners were even capable of handling. The image blurred as the big ship executed the maneuver.

  “Is Cormoran breaking up?” Athena snapped out.

  “One moment sir.” Johnson conferred for a couple seconds with her back room. “No sir, she has ejected cargo boxes…”

  “Holy shit.” Somebody whispered loudly. Cormoran’s tactic worked, the missiles detonated among the cargo boxes instead of closing with the big ship. She had ejected over a third of her cargo, creating a wall that any missile would be confused by.

  “The tanker wasn’t so lucky.” Heath commented. Athena switched her focus to the tanker, just as one of Fort Worth’s missiles detonated close aboard and touched off the fuel she had been carrying. The rapidly expanding plasma caught the other missile and fried it prior to detonation, adding yet another piece of debris.

  “Azov is breaking off, sir.” Johnson didn’t sound like she believed what she was saying. Athena wasn’t sure she did either. While she couldn’t say the battle was going well, Fort Worth springing the trap still didn’t mean it was lost. Then again, with two of three of the ships she was escorting gone, her captain probably saw little benefit. Ore carriers weren’t the reason for this mission, the destroyed Sevmorput was.

  “She’s energizing.” Johnson said, referring to the cruiser’s FTL field.

  “All railguns, fire, missiles to rapid-fire. Try and slow her down!” Athena ordered. She flipped her comm on to Fort Worth. “Weklar, Azov is running, let’s try and stop her.”

  “On it.” He responded quickly.

  Both ships fired on the retreating cruiser. Tripoli’s firing angle was still poor, trying to turn and close on the cruiser. Fort Worth had a better angle, but her guns were not large enough to pose serious danger to the cruiser. Additionally, her missile salvos were too small to have a significant chance of stopping a subspace transition in time. Azov continued to absorb the damage for another 10 seconds before she disappeared in the brief flash of subdued light.

  “Damn.” Athena swore quietly.

  “Tripoli, this is Fort Worth. Almost had her. We’re closing on the Cormoran now.” Weklar called over the comm, clearly disappointed as well.

  “Sir, Cormoran is broadcasting a surrender.” Daniels reported.

  “Put me through and put it up on the speakers.” Athena replied.

  “…surrender. Please do not shoot. I repeat, American ships, we surrender. Please do not kill us.” The voice came across in very lightly-accented English, the Russian speaker was clearly trained in the language of his enemy.

  “Cormoran, you are ordered to heave to and cut thrust. Engage breaking thrusters and reduce speed to 0.10C. You will be boarded. If you send any message, emit any signals or make any attempt at a sensor sweep, you will be immediately neutralized. Do you understand?” Athena commanded.

  “Yes, yes, we understand. Who are you?” The Russian captain, or Athena presumed it was the captain, pressed.

  “You’re only chance at getting home to see your family and home world. Now comply with my orders.” She said icily.

  “Understood.” He replied, slightly less fear in his voice and a small hint of annoyance. He didn’t seem to like being denied information.

  “Detach Hornets to cover her from astern, match velocity and maintain 1,000 km. Make sure they still have some working 92Bs. They are to shoot if my orders are violated. Then send another two gunboats to do a board and seizure.” Athena ordered.

  “Yes sir.” Daniels sent the commands from her station. “Sending Hornets 1 and 3 to cover from astern, they’ve got three each. Hornets 11 and 20 were first to respond for boarding duty.”

  “Advise them to use extreme caution on their approach.” Athena said. “And connect me with the marine commander of both gunboats, same line.”

  “Connection established.” Daniels cued.

  “Hornet boarding parties, this is Tripoli Actual. Report status.”

  “Tripoli actual, Sergeant Hamill aboard Hornet 20. I have a six-man boarding party, fully armored.”

  “Tripoli Actual, Corporal Bryce aboard Hornet 11, also with a six-man armored boarding party.”

  “The civilian ship you are about to board is an ore carrier and she has kindly offered to surrender. Conditions aboard that ship are unknown, so keep both eyes open. She pulled off some pretty impressive maneuvering to avoid a couple of nukes with her name on them, so I don’t expect the crew is completely composed of your average civvies. Lethal force is authorized without being fired upon. Don’t shoot on sight, but this is not to be treated as a simple boarding operation.” Athena told the two marines.

  “We’ll be ready sir, no carelessness on this op sir.” Hamill responded immediately.

  “I’ll keep my Marines in line sir. We’ll secure this ship for you sir.” Bryce responded a second behind Hamill, as his rank dictated he should.

  “Hamill, I’m sure you don’t need to be told but I’ll tell you anyway, you are in charge of this op. I expect reports as soon as practicable.”

  “Understood sir.” She said. “Both parties will be linked into the Tactical Awareness Network (TAN) so that you can track our progress if required.”

  “Good luck Marines. Tripoli Actual out.”

  Athena had the TAN link put up onto the forward view screen, 12 separate screens. Under each screen was the identifier for each marine. In the center was Sgt. Hamill and Cpl. Bryce’s windows, slightly larger than the rest. Those with little else to do, Tripoli’s bridge crew watched the five-minute operation. The Marines swept through the ship quickly but efficiently. Cormoran was a large ship, but her habitable areas were much smaller. A long narrow tube ran along the spine of the ship, connecting the forward habitation module with the aft engineering spaces. Sgt. Bryce led his team into engineering, securing the main compartments and detaining the two engineers they found there. Lt. Hamill and her team entered by the personnel hatch at the aft end of the habitation module. They moved forward quickly, securing the majority of the crew in the galley. It seemed that they had been told to assemble there, since there was no obvious signs of a meal in progress and several looked as though they had been elsewhere on th
e ship. When Hamill reached the bridge, they found just four individuals there.

  “Ship secure sir.” Hamill reported over the TAN.

  “Excellent work, Lieutenant. The Hornets will send over engineering teams to evaluate the ship. Please have an escort waiting for them. I would also like you to find a location to secure the crew aboard the ship. We are still in enemy space and I am not taking the time to shuttle them over here. NavInt and the top brass can decide what to do with them.”

  “Yes sir.” Hamill turned to address the bridge crew.

  While Athena awaited word that Cormoran’s crew had been secured, she tracked the outbound shuttle as it carried engineers from Tripoli over to the captured ship. The Hornet engineers were more than adequate to inspect the Russian systems, but they couldn’t remain aboard as a prize crew since the gunboats had small enough crews as it was. Athena could spare the men from Tripoli until friendly space. At least that was the assumption. The shuttle would not be returning, instead serving as the emergency escape from the Russian ore carrier in the event that the ship had to be abandoned. They were still behind enemy lines and the civillian life pods were dumb affairs, not capable of controlled flight. If those engineers and other crew had to leave, they would be able to rendezvous with one of the gunboats or Tripoli herself in a shuttle, it had the speed to maneuver with the larger ships.

  “Sir, the crew of the Cormoran are secured in the mess. The ship is ours and the engineers are boarding now.” Sgt. Hamill’s voice came over her comm.

  “Excellent work Sergeant. I’d like you to get the marine detachment I sent over briefed and then get yourself back aboard your gunboat.”

  “Yes sir. I’ll see to it immediately.” She replied smartly.

  Athena commed Daniels on the bridge.

  “”Daniels, arrange for Hornets 1 and 3 to be re-armed, priority docking. Any issues they have, if they can be fixed in the next hour, do it.” She paused for a moment before continuing. “Also get the other twelve gunboats ready to dock as soon as 1 and 3 are clear. We’re departing 30 minutes after 1 and 3 are clear. Make sure they understand that.” Athena finished with a tone that brooked no argument.