A Faded Star

by Michael Freeport

  “Good thinking, Aden,” Stokes said. “Is that everything?”

  “No, sir. I recommend we redeploy the automated drone platforms around Lashmere itself as a final line of defense. I also planned on using the Behemoth as the mobile fortress. Each time the rest of the fleet engages one of the crab formations moving through the system, Behemoth will maneuver to engage one of the other groups, harassing them and not letting them concentrate on hitting Lashmere directly. My local simulation says it has a worse chance of success than a straight line defense, but I don't think the simulation is assigning a suitable variable to the mobility of our forces.”

  “What if the crabs stay in a single group and move through the system?”

  “If that happens, we can run a series of flanking actions to break the fleet that survives the torpedo barrage in an effort to break them up into the smaller groups we need. If the crabs stay massed in a large group, we'll gnaw at their flanks and the outlying ships until we whittle their numbers down to a manageable amount and then hit them with an all out attack. Also, if the crabs stay massed, the railgun aboard Behemoth can be employed at least once. One shot from that weapon should convince the crabs to break into smaller groups we can then defeat with higher local concentrations of our own forces.”

  “We're relying a lot on unproven systems. We don't know for sure if the point to point drive on Behemoth even works. The railgun is still untested, and we can't be sure it will work either.”

  “Why can't we test the railgun at least?”

  “I'm letting Commodore Erickson run her own shakedown and training. She plans to test the gun tomorrow.”

  “That'll answer some tactical questions, provided it works, then,” Patho said.

  “We only have eight days at most,” Stokes said.

  “Have the crabs begun moving in our direction again, sir?”

  “Not yet. I plan to keep the fleet informed of all developments on that front as I become aware of them. I must say, Captain, your plan is one of the best I've heard so far. Almost everything the board of admirals has been considering has been a variation of either an all out line of battle or a type of layered defense, forcing the crabs to fight their way through us before they can get to Lashmere.”

  “None of those plans will work, sir. If we try a straight up fight without seriously diminishing their numbers, they will easily defeat us,” Patho said. “That's why I'm proposing this strategy.”

  “I'm not sure the board of admirals will approve anything that leaves Lashmere open to attack,” Stokes said.

  “Mind if I ask you a question, sir?”

  “Of course.”

  “How did the alliance get all those ships to move three hundred light years in a single hop? Even with Aeternum working on the problem, we can't make more than about fifty light year jumps.”

  “We're working on that problem right now. As you know, the principles behind the point to point drive system allow for unlimited distance of travel. The problem is one of energy production. If the alliance found a way to supply enough power to a variation of the point to point drive, the maneuver they used is completely possible, it's just the amount of energy needed that's in the realm of the unimaginable.”

  “I'm sure Marli will figure out how they did it, sir. Maybe we can adapt their strategy to protect Lashmere too.”

  “In eight days? I doubt it. The best we can hope for is it can't be used as a delivery system for their plague.”

  “I had forgotten about that, sir,” Patho said. “If they can send an entire fleet three hundred light years, sending a few kilos of virus another six or seven won't be much of an issue for them.”

  “You know, she came to me with a plan to raid all of the old Terran Empire facilities for their research. It was a pretty good plan, but I wanted to wait and see if we were going to need her here during the defense,” Stokes said.

  “Why don't you send her out? Her one ship won't make any real difference here.”

  “I don't want to send her out alone for starters, and I'm unwilling to weaken our defenses by even a single destroyer. The expedition she proposed needs far more than that. It needs at least two assault cruisers, a support ring, four destroyers, two stealth corvettes and her research corvette. Anything less than that and I don't think they have a good chance of returning. We just don't know what's out there. Our sensor range is less than three hundred twenty-five light years and some of the places she proposed to go were over ten thousand light years away.”

  Patho stared at something off his screen for a moment before putting on an assumed expression of confidence. Stokes recognized it for what it was, but he appreciated the effort the younger man made. “Once we've kicked the shells off these crabs, we'll put together a true task force to track down all the research she could ever want, sir.”

  Stokes said, “I'm sure we will, captain.”

  Marli Simmons sat in her office aboard the Loki. The movement of the crab fleet, or half of it, had gotten her to thinking. If it was possible to move a thousand ships three hundred light years, she should be able to move one ship a thousand, if not more. Knowing it was possible just made her more driven to find out the answer. The idea that some alliance scientist had a better understanding of the principals behind the point to point drive system made her insane inside. It was completely unacceptable in her mind to allow anyone to take technology she'd created and use it in a way she didn't understand.

  In the four days since the crab fleet had been moved by the alliance, she had barely slept, eaten virtually nothing and had spent all of her spare time in her cabin hammering at the problem. The crab fleet had begun moving within hours of being sent away by the alliance. All two thousand ships were massing for a strike on Lashmere. She'd taken the time to watch the Behemoth railgun fire. A large asteroid had been blown into trillions of tiny fragments no bigger than the tip of her finger. The energy released at the center of the explosion was more like the fusion reaction inside a star than a simple transfer of kinetic energy. Even she had been impressed with the potential for destruction the Behemoth held in reserve.

  Shaking off her suddenly distracted thoughts, she returned to the issue of energy, or lack of it and why it was so hard to move mass over large distances. Mass... Marli's head snapped up with a suddenness that made a joint in her neck scream in protest. Wincing and massaging the tormented disk, she used her free hand to pull up the drive specifications for Aeternum. The Aeternum used a system that essentially nulled the relationship of mass and space-time so that a ship could effectively 'skip' over the surface of a deeply distorted area created by the faster than light generator. The system allowed a ship to travel at speeds hundreds of times faster than the speed of light relative to the rest of the universe, but inside the field generated by the ship, it was moving along at a leisurely pace far slower. Somehow, the alliance had adapted the mass nullification field used in their form of faster than light travel and used it to reduce the amount of energy needed to send a ship through a jump ring or whatever variant of it they'd managed to reverse engineer from their sensor logs of Rampart's encounter with the crab destroyers.

  She worked feverishly, her fingers going numb from rapid and ongoing contact with her computer terminal. With a start, she realized the theoretical model had made a few assumptions about things she now knew were incorrect. She knew how to resolve these errors now that she'd struck on the idea of using a mass nullification field to decrease the energy requirements of a point to point drive. The mathematical calculations needed to solve the problems were just too complex to rely on the small standalone computer she used earlier, and she had to use the main computer on Loki to solve most of the problems. A slow smile started on her lips when she looked up and saw she'd been sitting in her chair for fourteen hours, having missed any possibility of sleep and also breakfast. As a matter of fact, she was late for her duty shift by a few minutes.

  She tugged on her uniform and copied the new calculations to her standalone computer
before erasing the simulations from the main computer core. Her eyes were grainy and blurry from lack of sleep and extended use of the computer, but her heart was flying. She had her answers, and she knew what she needed to do to get the information she so desperately wanted. Despite the scolding her captain was about to give her, she couldn't help but grin as she left for the bridge.

  The crab fleet arrived at the outskirts of the Lashmere system early in the morning. Stokes, having seen the rough arrival time had ordered all crews to take the last day and get lots of sleep and to maneuver their ships into various formations designed to make the crabs think the Lashmere Navy planned on making a line defense at the edge of their system.

  The Lashmere Navy moved into a formation with the battleships arrayed behind rows of assault cruisers. Destroyers and corvettes ranged out ahead in screening patterns. All of the ships had their point to point drive ready for activation at the designated times. With the crabs coming in full force, they were hopelessly outmatched in a stand-up fight. Stokes had worked hard to get the board of admirals to approve a variant of Patho's plan. The crab fleet would never be without a flanking force harrying its formations, never giving the crabs the opportunity to truly turn and attack.

  Stokes watched the main plot impassively as the crab formation moved into their position, almost as if they were in on the plan. There was no way the plan would stay together once they started using the point to point drives to maneuver, but at least the crabs cooperated for the first stage of the battle.

  “Mister Bendel, time for crab formation to be in position alpha?”

  “Thirty seconds, Admiral.”

  “Initiate first wave torpedo launch as planned. Order all ships to jump as calculated.”

  “All ships jump as calculated, aye, sir.”

  The Victorious, along with the other seven battleships, their assault cruisers, and destroyers all moved through their jump rings into a preplanned formation in virtual synchronous movement. The crab reaction was instantaneous, but, ultimately, futile. Three thousand torpedo launchers, seeded throughout the area where the fleet had been, launched simultaneously. The torpedoes were much faster than the crab ships.

  Stokes watched in silence as the target markers for their torpedoes started vanishing well short of the crab fleet. Their defensive fire was better than when Rampart had initially engaged them, but not as good as the simulations had predicted. As the ships took damage, sensors told a tale of massive destruction. Crab ships detonated, some taking nearby neighbors with them. The stealth corvettes had engaged their sensor masking systems just as the rest of the fleet had jumped out. They planned to insert mines directly in the paths of the largest crab ships. The effort wasn't likely to destroy all, or even most of the crab battleships, but each one that could be disabled would be one less the separate battle groups needed to engage.

  By the time the first wave of torpedoes had run its course, over five hundred crab ships were destroyed. The fleet moved inward in the system, turning to avoid the outer gas giant and moving into a location Stokes had marked on his plot as 'kill zone charlie'. The fifteen hundred ships moved as one, making turns and formation changes with machine like precision. Stokes couldn't help but admire the skill the crabs showed in handling their ships. The crabs were headed for the formation led by Victorious herself.

  “Launch drones, Mister Lokin,” Stokes said.

  Marli Simmons watched as the fleet scrambled to organize the defense of her home planet. She glanced at the chair next to her. Her commanding officer, Captain Gina Foster, engrossed in watching the details of the unfolding battle, never noticed the small data pad Simmons pulled from her uniform pocket.

  With a final glance at her captain, she tapped the button. Warning alarms began blaring from every speaker. Red warming lights sprung up all over the main plot. Foster sprang from her command chair, looking for the cause. Simmons had to admire the coolness with which Foster had reacted to the situation. A part of her hoped her career would survive what was coming.

  “Report the situation,” Foster said in a completely calm voice, standing in front of her command chair.

  “Looks like a containment variance, Captain,” the lieutenant assigned to operations said. “Level six. Full containment breach in thirty seconds.”

  “With no warning? Impossible.”

  Simmons cringed inwardly. If Foster figured out the containment failure wasn't actually occurring, she could kiss her plans for the future good-bye forever. “Captain, this is a brand new ship. If there was some kind of manufacturing defect in the point to point drive, a containment variance like this might occur.”

  The captain gave her an appraising look and started to say something just as the computer droned out, “Engagement failure in ten seconds. Full breach in two minutes.”

  “All hands abandon ship. Computer, alert the flagship we have a containment failure and to move all nearby ships to a safe distance,” Foster said.

  “Acknowledged,” the computer said.

  Simmons hustled off to where the escape pods for the bridge crew were located. This was the riskiest part of her plan. She had to have an escape pod of her own. She watched as the captain verified all hands were in their pods before giving Simmons a level look. “Get into a pod, commander. I'll see everyone else off.”

  Simmons risked a glance at the pod roster by the captain's chair before making a brisk move to the aft most port pod. It was listed as unoccupied.

  “Leave that one for me, commander. Meet up with Davidson and Freely in the forward pod.”

  “Yes, ma'am.” Simmons moved forward and entered the open pod hatch. She stepped in, seeing the two officers looking at her expectantly. She tapped her code into the roster pad inside the pod and nodded to them. She waited for the five second countdown to begin, knowing it would only be initiated once the captain was in a pod herself. Simmons risked a backward glance and saw the door swinging shut before leaping out of the pod. She felt the ship lurch as the pods began launching. She had less than ten seconds before she would be evacuated into the vacuum of space behind the pod she'd just jumped out of. She clawed at the door override and scuttled back through. Slamming the door shut, she whirled to look around the bridge. The remaining escape pods were all launching. She ran to the command chair and checked the crew roster. She was the only assigned crew member still aboard.

  Her breath caught in her throat. Adrenaline surged through her, making her thoughts fuzzy and her movements imprecise. Taking a second, larger tablet out of her pocket in a shaking hand, she executed the command override sequence she'd put in place. The false sensor readings immediately stopped. The point to point drive began to spool up, a predestined twenty-one light year jump was preset to take her to an adjacent star system.

  Glancing over the readings, she saw her program was performing flawlessly. Jubilation started to wash over her. She was going to do it. Her face stretched into a smile like she'd never had. Hundreds of years of life, waiting just beyond her fingertips. She could sense the potential already around her. She was just starting to ponder what she'd do first when a comm request came in. She ignored it, but a remote override allowed the main plot to turn on.

  Stokes' face was grim, almost skull like with the features pulled taught in worry and stress. “I don't know what you think you're smiling about, commander. You will release control of that ship immediately and report to Lashmere Naval Headquarters for arrest. Do you understand me?”

  Simmons dropped all pretense at maintaining military bearing. “Look, Admiral, I don't give a damn about your orders. When I come back and offer the people of Lashmere lives that stretch on for hundreds of years, you won't be able to touch me. You'll be lucky if they don't throw me a parade in celebration.”

  “We're in the middle of the fight for the survival of our people, here. You choose now to take this action? I can't believe even you could be so self-centered.”

  “No! I'm not self-centered. You are. You refused to see the value in
my proposal.” She glanced at the countdown. “Five seconds. I'll show you I'm right.” The display cut off suddenly as the ship maneuvered automatically through the jump ring it had formed.

  Bendel started at the main plot in horror as their stealth ship was stolen by one of the foremost scientific minds on Lashmere. “Is... I mean, she can't be serious, sir?”

  “No time to think about it, right now, Mister Bendel. Concentrate on keeping those drones between us and those four battleships. Miss Woodard, what's the status of Behemoth?”

  “Fully loaded. All five million civilians are aboard.”

  “Good. I want you to send to Commodore Erickson to maneuver to the far side of the planet. The crabs are spilling around the ring system and are moving outside our program area. If they realize we don't have torpedo launchers on both sides of the planet, they'll make a run straight at Lashmere rather than engage us.”

  “Aye, sir. Behemoth is moving into position now. ETA is seven minutes. Sir, Commodore Erickson sends she has a shot with the railgun. A concentration of ships near Admiral Brand's formation.”

  “She's clear to engage at her discretion.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “Put that formation up on the main plot, Miss Woodard.” The plot shifted to show Brand's battlecruisers standing behind a moon. A crab force was moving to pincer him on both sides, but his point to point drives were already spooled up. His ships should be able to jump before they were truly in danger. A line of ships vanished from the crab formation.

  Startled gasps went up all around the bridge. All crab ships started moving inward towards Lashmere. Their ruse had run its course.

  “Looks like we have to make our stand, now. Order Mister Patho to engage his mines.” The mines should be on most, if not all, the crab battleships by now. Hopefully, most of them would be disabled. A band of warming signals began to stream across the main plot. Dozens of battleships exploded or were crippled by mines attached to their hulls. “Mister Patho saves the day again. Mister Lokin what's the crab fleet count?”