by Jay Allan
“Yes. Okay, Victor! We’ll see you there! Good luck!”
Shiloh heard the com channel cut off and shifted his focus back to the squadron channel. The squadron was still at Battle Stations so he said, “Shiloh to squadron! The enemy is back for more punishment. Concentrate your targeting as before and open fire!”
Shifting to the channel with LaRoche, he said, “Hiram, we’ve got to keep them busy while the tankers jump away!”
“Okay, Victor! The 153rd will back you up!”
Shiloh remembered that Mbutu had ordered Rolen to do something he might not be able to.
“Shiloh to squadron. Each frigate will launch a message drone to jump back to the Task Force with a tactical update asap!”
With eight message drones launched, even if the enemy detected them and fired on them, there was still a good chance that at least one would get through. Even if the others were destroyed, at least they would divert some of the enemy fire. Shiloh hoped that LaRoche would order his squadron to launch their own spread of message drones as soon as they detected those from the 144th. Turning his attention back to the Tactical display, Shiloh saw that the enemy vector was almost at right angles to the frigates, but he could already tell that the enemy ships were clawing their way around in an effort to keep the range from opening further. Shiloh made the display zoom in. He saw the 144th launch message drones, and a few seconds later the 153rd followed suit. Almost at the same time, enemy ships started taking hits and falling out of formation. Shiloh checked to see if the tankers had jumped and couldn’t find any still there. He spoke out loud, to no one in particular.
“Did all the tankers jump away?”
It was Chenko who answered.
“Yellowjacket was destroyed almost immediately. The others managed to jump away.”
“Damn!” Shiloh pounded the armrest of his Command Station chair. He was about to say more but Chenko spoke first.
“307’s lost maneuvering ability!”
307 was one of his ships. Shiloh quickly switched com channels and 307’s CO appeared.
“What’s your situation, Tom?”
“We’re in bad shape, Sir. Main power’s go—”
The picture and sound cut off abruptly. Shiloh looked up just in time to see the breakup of the green hexagon symbol that was Frigate 307. Before he could react, one of LaRoche’s ships also broke apart. LaRoche was still on the open channel, and just as Shiloh turned to the screen to say something, every light and electronic device on the Bridge went dark. Shiloh felt the artificial gravity fail, as well as his Command Station chair’s automatic restraints locking in. In half a second, the emergency lights came on, but nothing else.
Not hesitating for a second he said, “XO! I’m taking back the Con. Get down to Engineering and find out what happened. If they still have power down there, you’ll have to pilot the ship from Engineering. We’ve got to maneuver in order to avoid being a sitting duck!”
As Chenko braced herself to push off for a leap in zero G at the access tube, Shiloh turned to the Com Tech and said, “Do we have any ship to ship communications at all?”
The Com Tech shook his head. Shiloh hit his chair armrest again. His ship was blind, deaf and crippled. It was liable to be cut to pieces with concentrated laser fire any second, and there was absolutely nothing he could do about it! Seconds seemed to last minutes. He knew that Chenko would be trying to get to Engineering as fast as possible, but with no gravity, moving down the length of the hull would take time. As the seconds and then minutes passed with no lethal blow, Shiloh began to hope that they would survive this nasty turn of events.
Finally, after almost five excruciating minutes, the power came back on just as suddenly as it had cut off. To avoid serious injury, the artificial gravity came back on very slowly. As the Com Tech tried to re-establish communication channels, Shiloh watched the Tactical display sort out the incoming data from sensors. When the display settled down, Shiloh saw that that there were NO red triangles at all! Instead there were a lot more green hexagons. It looked as though the rest of the Task Force had arrived. One of Shiloh’s com screens light up to reveal Task Force Leader Mbutu.
“Ah! Glad to see that you’re back, Victor!”
Shiloh nodded. “Yes, Sir. We seem to be operational again. What happened, Sir?”
“Well, the enemy force jumped away, almost literally, as soon as we showed up! I understand from Hiram that four of our tankers managed to get away, and that we will meet up with them again in Zebra 7.”
“I hope so, Sir. The tankers weren’t lined up for a jump directly to Zebra 7, so they would have had to micro-jump somewhere else in this system first, then change heading for the jump to Zebra 7. I just hope that the alien force didn’t ambush them before they were able to jump outsystem.”
Mbutu looked thoughtful. “Yes. Let’s hope so. Given that they arrived here so quickly, there doesn’t seem to be any doubt now that they’re able to detect ships emerging from hyperspace. Thank God you recommended sending two squadrons here asap! If we hadn’t done that, all of the tankers would likely have been destroyed, and then the entire Task Force would have been lost from eventual fuel exhaustion.”
He paused before adding, “While my squadrons are maneuvering to link up with yours, the 144th and 153rd can finish transferring survivors from your damaged ships. As soon as all that’s done, we’ll head straight for Zebra 7. Commander Tanaka will be temporarily assuming the post of squadron leader for the 153rd. Any questions?”
“No, Sir.”
“Fine. Mbutu clear.”
As Shiloh was about to attempt to reconnect with the rest of his squadron, Chenko returned to the Bridge and walked quickly over to him.
“What happened to us, XO?”
“We took a partial hit that penetrated just deep enough to sever a main power linkage from the power plant to the rest of the ship. I checked our repair log from the shipyard, and that particular section of the hull wasn’t armored. The actual amount of energy used to cut the linkage was relatively small compared to the impact of the damage. It seems to be a design flaw that might explain other ships being crippled in battle. We were lucky that we didn’t suffer any more hits after that. Offhand I’d say we probably took a hit that was aimed at someone else and missed.”
“Good work, XO! I’ve just spoken with TFL Mbutu and we’re in the process of reforming the Task Force. After that we’ll head for Zebra 7, hopefully find the remaining tankers, and then head home. Until we’re in hyperspace, I want you to con this ship from the Helm as before while I con the squadron.”
“Yes, Sir.”
Chenko moved to the Helm Station where Verlander was already getting up to move aside. Shiloh held a hasty view screen conference with his remaining six frigates, none of which had suffered any serious damage. All six COs seemed to be relieved to hear that the Task Force was heading home. With a roughly 55 hour hyperjump ahead of them, there was not the sense of urgency that they had experienced with the micro-jump. By accelerating to a higher speed, the Task Force was likely to arrive at Zebra 7 star system before the tankers did, however at that distance it was very unlikely they would emerge anywhere near each other. With only one gas giant, the rendezvous point was obvious. If the tankers got there first, they would refuel and wait for the Task Force to show up, using passive sensors only. When the Task Force arrived, it would scan the vicinity of the gas giant with active sensors. If it detected four ships, it would attempt to make contact from a safe distance. The Task Force regrouped, changed heading and entered hyperspace, all without further enemy contact. Once in the safety of hyperspace, Shiloh cancelled Battle Stations and the ship returned to its normal routine.
During the hyperjump, Shiloh briefed each off-duty section of the crew about the details of the two encounters so that everyone knew what happened. Most of the crew were upset that Mbutu had chosen to abort the mission, but Shiloh explained to them that with only four tankers left to get the rest of the surviving frigates
home, it would be reckless to remain in Zebra 9. The enemy clearly recognized what the tankers were, and were gunning for them. He also started working on his After-Action reports. Once again he omitted the vision he experienced that had prevented an even worse outcome. If all six frigate squadrons had not taken the time to refuel upon arrival at Zebra 9, it was highly likely that the command ship and tanker squadron would have been ambushed and destroyed before any frigate squadron could come to its rescue. Even if the tankers had micro-jumped away, the alien ships would have detected their emergence location and micro-jumped after them. Without the tankers, the rest of the Task Force would have been destroyed either fighting the superior enemy force one squadron at a time, or they would have jumped to another star system only to eventually run out of fuel altogether, their crews eventually dying from lack of oxygen. In Shiloh’s mind the whole operation was a tactical defeat, yet a strategic victory in the sense that the enemy force had tried and ultimately failed to use its hyperspace emergence technology to completely ambush the expected attacking force. If no ship survived to return to base with that crucial information, the aliens would continue to have that advantage and perhaps ambush more squadrons. So, for the loss of 13 frigates, 8 tankers and 1 command ship, but thankfully not all of those crews, Space Force had acquired some very valuable intel, and 35 frigates and four tankers—hopefully—would make it back to live and fight another day. It was a painful price to have to pay, but Shiloh felt it would ultimately be worth it.
The arrival at Zebra 7 was, as expected, uneventful. Having emerged in the outer edges of the system, the Task Force had to proceed under normal space drive to the gas giant. The recon drone left in orbit around the gas giant to monitor enemy activity had downloaded sensor data that showed no discernible activity, enemy or friendly, during the time since the last visit here. That didn’t concern Shiloh very much. Mbutu had ordered the Task Force to accelerate prior to jumping, which meant that they could easily have arrived first, having passed the tankers somewhere in hyperspace. Once in orbit around the gas giant, the Task Force spent a nervous 14 hours until a signal from the tankers confirmed their arrival insystem. As soon as the tankers entered orbit, they began the task of refueling the Task Force. Since that task would take almost 33 hours to complete, any frigate not being refueled at any given point in time was in a higher orbit, actively scanning for enemy ships.
On a hunch, Shiloh ordered his squadron to also scan the surfaces of the 13 moons orbiting the gas giant. After multiple passes, one of those moons finally revealed its secret. An alien device that was too small to be anything other than a passive detection device was spotted from its very tiny radar reflection. Given that no ship had been detected deploying the device after the recon drone was deployed in orbit, it was clear that the ground unit had been placed there before the raid was even contemplated. Perhaps even before Yakamura’s reconnaissance mission! If that were the case, then the aliens would have a rough idea from which part of the sky Space Force ships were coming. When Shiloh had notified Mbutu about the alien device and his concerns about leading the enemy back towards Human Space, Mbutu concurred and said that when the Task Force was ready to leave, it would take a detour in the wrong direction before resuming its journey back home. The two of them debated whether to leave the device alone and pretend they hadn’t noticed it, or destroy it now. Shiloh was in favor of leaving it intact in order to preserve the options of some kind of strategic deception operation in the future. Mbutu disagreed, and in his capacity as Task Force Leader, he ordered Shiloh’s squadron to destroy the device immediately. Shiloh decided that the 344 would do the task. One well-aimed laser shot turned the device into a slag pile of melted metal.
At last the entire Task Force was refueled, and the tankers were topped up as well. Mbutu ordered the Task Force to retrace its inward path in order to confuse the enemy, just in case there was another detection device watching them. When the Task Force was almost a light hour from the gas giant, TF79 turned back towards their real destination, which was Zebra 3, bypassing 4, 5 and 6 altogether. The recon drones left to monitor Zebra 3’s two gas giants didn’t reveal any sign of enemy activity, and the ships of the squadron took a very close look at the moons of both of them without finding any alien devices. With that refueling going off without a hitch, and the task force back in hyperspace on its way to one more refueling stop before arriving back at SFB Bradley, Shiloh and the rest of his crew began to relax. The arrival back at Bradley was anticlimactic. Since all Space Force bases were close enough to each other to be reached with one full load of fuel, TF79’s frigate squadrons were no longer dependent on their tankers, which were detached as per orders that were waiting for them. TF79 arrived back in Earth orbit almost two months after heading out on the attack mission. No sooner had the task force settled down into its parking orbit than orders arrived from the Chief of Operations for all COs and XOs to report to HQ asap. Shiloh had a feeling Admiral Howard would not be happy.
CHAPTER 9: Payback’s A Bitch
It was night and raining when the shuttle, carrying Shiloh, Chenko and the other COs and XOs from his squadron, landed at the spaceport outside Geneva. Space Force vans were waiting to take them to Headquarters. Some of the other squadrons had already landed their officers. When they arrived at HQ, they were shown into the same large auditorium where Howard had briefed everyone on the first encounter. Since not everyone was there yet, those officers who had arrived were allowed to walk around and chat with others. Mbutu’s squadron, what was left of it, had already landed its officers, but Mbutu himself was not in sight. Shiloh overheard one of his officers say that Mbutu was in a private debriefing with Admiral Howard himself. After a while, more officers showed up, and soon after that one of Admiral Howard’s staff came and asked everyone to take a seat. Shiloh and Chenko sat at the end of the second row. Just as everyone was getting settled down, the staff officer shouted out.
“Attention on deck!”
Everyone jumped to attention and stopped talking. Admiral Howard entered the auditorium followed by Cmdr. Mbutu, who took the nearest vacant seat. Howard strolled leisurely to the center of the stage, folded his arms across his chest, and began.
“Well, here we are. Space Force has lost … one command ship, eight tankers, 13 frigates … and 987 officers and crew. I’ve just spent the last hour with Acting Task Force Leader Mbutu going over his summary of what happened, and I’ve skimmed the After-Action reports of the various squadron leaders who transmitted their reports while en route to Near Earth Orbit. I have a pretty good idea of how Operation Dropkick went down.”
He paused to look around at his audience. The room was dead silent. Howard started to pace slowly across the front of the stage, from side to side and back again, speaking as he went.
“In the days and weeks to come, those who weren’t there will look at the results, including the fact that none of the alien infrastructure facilities in Zebra 9 were damaged or destroyed, and they’ll conclude that Operation Dropkick was a disaster, a major defeat for the Space Force. That is not my view of the operation, and it shouldn’t be yours. Granted, you did not inflict any damage on the alien mining operations, but their destruction was never expected to be more than an inconvenience to the aliens. The raid was primarily intended to give the participating squadrons some combat experience, along with experience in working with a larger formation, as well as obtaining additional insight and intel on alien capabilities, tactics and operating procedures. From THAT perspective, the mission was at least partially successful. Let’s also not forget that the enemy took some losses too! Only five enemy ships were confirmed as destroyed outright, but another seven suffered obvious damage, and we can reasonably expect them to be out of action for a while. Given that they clearly have the ability to detect ships emerging from hyperspace, and were therefore able to catch TF79 by surprise, I’m actually impressed that our losses weren’t higher. Now that we know about their detection capabilities AND the fact that they’v
e planted automated detection stations beyond their actual sphere of operation, we can adjust our plans accordingly. I consider getting that intel back to us here to be a major accomplishment. So while it’s perfectly acceptable to mourn our lost comrades-in-arms, you should also feel that their sacrifice was NOT in vain!
“So what do we do now? Well, frankly not very much. The loss of those tankers is going to effectively curtail any possibility of conducting offensive operations in strength, much beyond the support range of our forward bases. In the near term, that means that Space Force will have to remain on the defensive while we rebuild our tanker capability. So, no more raids for at least six months. That does not mean, however, that we’ll be sitting on our hands. Once my staff works out the details, we will deploy our frigates in a way that hopefully will allow us to detect any enemy incursion into star systems that would put them within striking distance of those forward bases closest to them. While that is going on, our shipyard capacity will continue to expand, and we’ll start to see new ship designs becoming operational. Here’s what you can look forward to.”
He motioned to his aid, who manipulated a device, and the large view screen behind Howard came to life. It showed two ships. Howard continued.
“I’m sure you recognize the design at the bottom as the exploration frigate that all of you have come to know and love.”
Howard’s playful sarcasm generated a ripple of chuckles from the audience.
“The FE class of frigates are 245 meters long, 44 meters wide, mass approximately 22,000 metric tons, carry up to six drones externally and are armed with two laser turrets, one on top and the other below. The other ship will be the new FA class of armored combat frigates. Don’t be misled by its shorter length. It’s actually a much larger ship massing almost 50,000 tons. It doesn’t seem larger because you’re looking at it from the side. Here is a better view from above.”
The image changed and Shiloh heard whistles of appreciation.