by Tyler Totten
“CORE should be operational on all ships any minute now. How are the plasma cannons looking?” Athena inquired.
“My technicians assure me they’ll shoot, at least once.” Martin said, though his voice wasn’t very confidence inspiring.
“What about containment stability?”
“That’s the kicker, sir. I’ve been given no better than a 50-50 chance that one of the tubes won’t fail after the first shot.” Martin responded. “The chances are about the same that it will be a catastrophic failure, so I’ve got that going for me.” He ended with some gallows humor.
“I want you to take whatever precautions you can to evacuate the possible blast area, even if it slows the plasma firing rate.” Athena said, more than a touch concerned.
“I’ll do what I can, sir. We need a certain number of personnel in several adjacent compartments to prevent a catastrophic tube failure prior to the shot. If I don’t keep them there, well, I may lose the ship.” Martin’s voice clearly conveyed that he understood the weight of his words. Athena knew the choice wouldn’t be easy to live with if disaster struck.
“Very well. We’re jumping in two minutes. Good luck Captain.” Athena became more formal.
“Good luck Admiral, see you on the other side.” Martin copied her tone. “Thunderer actual out.”
Athena closed the comm and concentrated on the 3D tactical display. Thunderer had maneuvered to lead the formation once again. The Armadillos flanked her in plane with the system’s elliptic. Athena watched as the rest of her formation fell into place, with the three ACGs arranging in a line perpendicular and just behind their companions. Finally, the surviving eighteen gunboats formed up in a loose formation protected by their larger compatriots. They quickly shook out into three six-boat squadrons.
“FTL point in thirty seconds.” Conway intoned.
“Drive is green, navigator has passed plot and track.” Masters added.
Athena watched the proceedings, only half listening to the confirmations. She focused on the plot, still displaying the angry red dots that indicated the Chinese formation. They were waiting, but Athena didn’t know if they had something up their sleeve, if she was walking into a trap. The next hour in subspace would be the most nerve-wracking. After that, they’d be committed and unable to turn back. Whatever was waiting for them, they’d have to face.
Athena busied herself throughout the journey, doing paperwork and other tasks from her CIC console. The time passed slowly, but still quicker than Athena had anticipated. She realized with a small amount of shock that she was finally getting used to the knowing anxiety that had always plagued her before going into combat. It hadn’t diminished, she had merely developed some sort of understanding with it. Something to mull later, over a strong drink perhaps.
“Drop-out in one minute.” Ensign Masters reported, crisp as ever. He didn’t even sound fatigued.
“All ships still report ready sir. We’re good to go.” Daniels preempted Athena’s question. She was becoming quite the accomplished deputy.
“Excellent. Let’s nail the bastards.” Athena said, her voice full of confidence she didn’t feel. “All ships, prepare to receive incoming fire. Point defense free.”
“Aye, sir. Point defense transferred to computer control. The XO is in Aux Con. Missile tubes on stand-by, ready to fire on your command. All weapons are hot.” Heath reported from tactical.
“Drop-out in five, four, three, two, one, emergence!” Masters’ voice rose in volume slightly. Athena let it pass, the kid was a rock in combat and so this little emotional response wasn’t a point of concern.
“We’re 520,000 kilometers from the enemy force.” Conway reported quickly.
“Yankee search.” Athena commanded. She was still amazed at how many times she had activated the powerful radar. Pre-war doctrine had focused on passive sensors, finding and striking the enemy from relative stealth and using surprise. Instead, the enemy knew where she was almost every time and she needed better targeting data, forcing the Yankee search routines. Just one more thing wrong from the pre-war tactical analyses.
“Chinese are also going active.” Johnson reported as she complied. “Search complete, all Chinese ships accounted for, no new contacts. They’re all here sir.”
Decoys?” Athena asked suspiciously.
“At this range sir, I don’t think so. They’d have to be damn good ones, better than ours. We’re getting solid mass, subspace, and energy signatures off from all contacts. No shadows or fuzzy returns. As she finished, the tactical display took on a new fuzzy shade. “They’ve started jamming, targeting frequencies. All bands.”
“At least they can’t target either.” Heath reflected.
“For now.” Athena countered. “They just want us closer first, then they’ll selectively disable jamming for their own targeting.”
“We’re already well within range.” Heath said. “They must be going for a real sucker punch.”
“They saw what we did to the other group, they’re being calculating. They want a sure kill.” Athena turned and smiled her feral grin. Only Heath and Daniels could see it through her helmet face plate. “But we’re not going to give it to them.”
They returned the smile, though theirs were substantially less feral.
“We still have tracks on the ships, but not target quality.” Johnson interjected.
“Fire drones, get me burn through on their ECM.” Athena snapped out. “All ships with drones are to participate. Saturate them in one salvo.”
“Aye sir.” Johnson responded. She coordinated with Daniels and the other ships. “Sir, we’re ready. This will leave us very low on drones.”
“We’re going to be out of missiles anyways, we’ll have little need of them.” Athena responded. “Launch.”
“Launching.” Johnson responded. Thirty drones sped away, already jinking and maneuvering to stay out of targeting. Several had their own jammers and began to add to the confusion.
“Jam their targeting.” Athena added.
“Jamming commencing.” Johnson was very busy. Heath opened a window to assist. He already had his missiles ready to go and was doing very little.
“Burn through.” Johnson called out several minutes later. “Target quality tracks.”
“All ships, launch salvo.” Athena ordered.
“Ships commencing salvo in five seconds.” Daniels responded.
“Tripoli is commencing in two, one, firing.” Heath’s announcement was punctuated by the shimmer in the deck as Tripoli disgorged her missiles into space. They were the last ones in DSF-1. Fifty six missiles jumped from the group and sped across the intervening space.
“Enemy is responding. Identifying and attempting to jam targeting channels. They’ve selectively stopped jamming.” Johnson reported.
“Here we go.” Heath said softly and with concern evident in his voice, all over the CIC comm link. Athena turned and gave him a quick glare. He silently communicated his apologies.
“Vampire, vampire!” Johnson’s call immediately wiped Heath’s slip from everyone’s thoughts. “One hundred and six inbounds. Not quite a max salvo, but damn close sir.”
“Fighter-bombers?” Athena asked quickly.
“Not yet sir. No indication of launch.” Johnson responded.
“Point defense has the inbounds.” Heath reported. “Engaging in seventy seconds. Own salvo will enter Chinese point defense in thirty-three seconds.”
“Fighter-bomber launch, sir.” Johnson added more good news. “Looks like they’ll be entering just behind the missiles. Full complement of thirty has launched sir. For the record sir, they launched five seconds short of the fastest we’ve seen.”
“Very well.” Athena grumbled more in her head than a simple acknowledgement. That quick of a launch meant that she was dealing with veterans, not rooks. Any hope of facing off against an inferior tactician was gone now. Her thoughts were quickly pulled back to more pressing matters.
“Missiles entering
outer point defense perimeter. All ships in automatic and cooperative.” Heath reported, his voice still calm in the face of gigatons of nuclear warheads. “Missiles are separating. Twenty missiles have separated, decoys and warheads deployed. Classified as medium weight missiles. Remaining eighty-six missiles are still intact, now classified as heavy-weight missiles based upon behavior.”
Athena continued to listen as the missiles closed and were blotted out. She had no real role, the fate of DSF-1 was in the hands of her crews and each ship’s computer. Much of the intense fighting was dependent on computers, the reactions times required were just too quick for human minds to handle.
“Inbounds reduced to forty heavies and four mediums. Missiles are entering terminal, seekers are in full active. Targets confirmed. All missiles are targeted on Tripoli, Normandy, and Inchon. They’re going for the ACGs sir.” Heath reported, his voice still remarkably stable.
“Understood.” Athena responded levelly.
“Terminal point defense.” Heath said quickly, trying to keep up with the rapidly evolving picture. “Detonations, two, five, twelve.” His statement was punctuated by Tripoli rumbling and rocking. Several alarms began blaring softly from consoles all across DC and the lights dimmed for a moment.
“Status?” Athena demanded.
“Sir.” Johnson spoke up, now that the missiles had all detonated, she took over. Heath was focused on their own missiles now. “Two detonations bracketed us, both heavies. Medium range, unknown damage at this time. Inchon was within twenty kilometers of a medium, only light damage reported. Normandy was bracketed by five warheads, damage unknown. No report from Normandy. All other warheads detonated out of effective range for their warheads.”
“Daniels?” Athena prompted.
“Attempting to contact Normandy. We lost our link to her when the warheads detonated. Still no active comm.” Daniels responded, clearly still distracted as she focused on finding an open channel to the ship.
“Keep trying. Johnson, what are you getting from Normandy on sensors? Turn some optics on her if you need to.” Athena ordered.
“Yes sir. I have several trained on her already. She looks to be in rough shape but is maintaining her position in the formation. She staggered during the explosion but regained her position with a burst of acceleration, so she seems to still have engine control. Her thrust is below nominal output, but it is difficult to tell if that is due to damage or not. Fighter-bombers entering firing range.”
“She’ll have to take care of herself for now then. Put one of your people on it, then focus on the bombers.” Athena said.
“Aye sir.” Johnson responded, already distracted by the new threat. “Vampire, vampire. Sprint missiles, light-weights. One hundred and twenty.”
“Point defense is engaging. Gunboats are going for the fighter bombers exclusively.” Heath reported in turn.
“Sir!” Johnson interjected. “Sprint missiles are targeted on AMCs, all of them.”
“Well now, they’ll regret that.” Athena said, her mood slightly improved. The AMCs had initially been designed with these sprint missiles in mind. The fighter-bombers hadn’t adapted their tactics to the new ships and so they focused on overwhelming the point defense of Ticonderoga and Port Royal. What they didn’t know was that these ships didn’t overwhelm easily. Their repulsors and terminal point defense were designed to brush off sprint missiles. It took heavier missiles than that to get through. They had better thrust profiles and even light repulsors to help them deal with the defensive shotguns.
“Yes sir, I bet they are.” A short pause. “All inbounds defeated. Port Royal reports minor radiation penetration of several compartment and some repulsors tripped in overload. They are overall undamaged.” Johnson reported happily.
“They won’t make that mistake again. If any of them make it for a second pass they’ll load heavies.” Athena cautioned.
“Yes sir. But they have to get back to their carrier for that.” Johnson remarked.
“They do indeed.” Athena agreed.
“Our missiles entering Chinese point defense envelope.” Heath jumped in. “Point defense is strong and well-coordinated, ten down, fifteen, twenty, thirty-five down. Twenty-one remain and are entering terminal mode. Closing and…detonation. Five detonations. Two bracketed the battleship. The other three got in tight on a light cruiser.”
“Looks like that cruiser is down and out, too.” Johnson reported. “Power is failing, turrets and repulsors are powering down.” Johnson paused for a moment. “Yup, her reactors just ejected their cores, we’ve got their energy signatures leaving the ship. She’s done sir.”
“Next step then, the knife fight. Time to railgun range?” Athena asked.
“One minute to no-jink range.” Heath reported after checking Conway’s most up-to-date plot. The no-jink range was the range at which it wasn’t statistically worth it to maneuver to confuse enemy railguns. The track speeds of guns and the speed of the rounds meant that the maneuvers would actually subject you to about the same amount of hits as if you didn’t maneuver and instead sped through the engagement zone.
“Status of CORE?” Athena turned to Daniels for this one.
“Captain Martin has just initialized it sir. All ships are moving into final formation and operating under helm control from Thunderer.” Daniels reported quickly.
Athena watched the tactical plot as Thunderer’s computer and helmsman pulled DSF-1 into an incredibly tight formation. On the 3D display a new purple bubble formed around the ships, designating the CORE interface.
“Let’s see what they make of this formation.” Heath said with humor. “They’ll probably think we’ve lost it.”
“Won’t they be surprised. “ Athena said, though in her mind she wondered if they might not be right.
“CORE is at full power and operating as within desired parameters… at least I think it is.” Daniels said, puzzling over the display.
“Thunderer just put plasma cannons into charge mode.” Johnson said, comparing the strange energy readings she was getting with the profile of a plasma cannon charging as provided by Captain Martin. “Ten seconds to ready.”
“No jink in five seconds.” Heath added.
“All main batteries, preference your fire on the remaining light cruiser and the carrier. Secondary turrets fire on the corvettes. Leave the destroyers for the gunboats.” Athena commanded. She flipped over to the pre-readied comm channel to the gunboats. “Hornets, this is Athena. Bag those destroyers for me.”
“Yes sir.”
“For the Goddess of War!”
“Consider it done.”
Athena listened to the various replies over her comm, smiling inside her helmet. She was pleased but at the same time saddened. She knew they would accomplish her task, but they would do so no matter the cost. They knew the stakes, but that didn’t make it a simple thing.
“Good luck to you all. I know I can count on you.” Athena still couldn’t help but use their devotion to her advantage. It was the only way anyone would survive to make it home. Victory or death. Or both.
“Sir, Thunderer is about to fire.” Johnson was both apprehensive and excited. Plasma cannons had never been used in combat before.
“Main screen.” Athena snapped out, anxious to see it herself. She ignored the rocking and alarms that continued to erupt around CIC as Tripoli absorbed incoming fire. They were well within the no jink distance now.
Thunderer appeared on the screen, the angle seeming to come from a camera on Thunderer herself, looking from the top spine somewhere near the bow. Suddenly, two amazingly bright balls of violet plasma sped away, launched at relativistic velocities. They crossed the intervening distance in the blink of an eye. The plasma cannons were truly cannons, firing unguided balls of plasma contained by an artificial gravity generator at its core. As the projectile was launched, the generator began to heat up, using evaporation of a solid insulation to keep the generator cool for up to ten seconds. After that, th
e field would collapse and with it the integrity of the plasma. The weapons were only good at close ranges and straight paths.
These two found their target, slamming into the repulsors of the Chinese battleship at nearly three-quarters of the speed of light. Between the thermal and kinetic energy imparted, the repulsors were quickly overwhelmed and the plasma pushed through to actually make contact with the hull. While the battleship was tough, her bow couldn’t handle the extreme temperatures. The armor melted away, followed by the forward compartments. On screen, Athena watched as the bow seemed to blow inward.
“Two good hits.” Johnson reported. “The battleship’s fusion reactors appear to have scrammed. Lots of secondary explosions across the bow, looks like point defense and secondary armaments. Her missile bays seem unaffected. No chain reaction. She’s in bad shape, but she’s not dead sir.”
“Damn, she’s a tough bastard.” Athena said softly. She’d hoped that the battleship would be completely out of the fight. “Is she firing at all?”
“No sir, cold guns.”
“Bypass her, switch to other targets.”
“Sir!” Johnson gasped, her eyes locked on her screen. “Thunderer…”
Athena spun back to look at the screen just in time to see a massive fireball extinguished in the vacuum. Athena spun towards Daniels and was about to snap out a command.
“Captain Martin for you, sir.” Daniels said, pre-empting her.
“Martin, status?” Athena skipped any greeting.
“Sir, the number two cannon blew out my port side. Number one cannon is out as well but didn’t overload. My bow is in bad shape. She’ll hold together, I just can’t afford to take any more hits up there.” Martin coughed over the comm. Athena could hear klaxons and the distinctive sound of escaping gas over the comm.
“Do you not have a helmet on?” Athena asked, concerned.
“Broke the damn visor when an overhead display took a trip to the deck. I’m getting a replacement now. I’ve got major damage ship-wide, but we’re holding together. CORE is still online and my helmsman is a rock.” Martin said, his voice was hoarse from the smoke, but still sounded confident.