by Randy Dyess
“You think they’ll take the bait?” Dakota asked Captain Moore as the six task force captains, Robert, Lt. Davids, and Cheyenne held a last-minute briefing before sending the Seraphim onward to Meltus.
“Yes. I think someone on Taurus Prime is having a conversation with Florres right this minute, telling him that we’re in orbit over the planet. I hope this makes him think we are trying to trick him by hiding the replacement cargo on a smaller freighter that would never deliver something as valuable as a ton of U-981.”
It had been just over a week since Sullivan Shipping and the Candus Corporation had come up with a plan to trap the Pirate King and destroy his fleet and base of operations. Enough time had elapsed that the cargo manifest and delivery schedule for the Seraphim should have made it into the hands of one of Florres’ informants. With the defenseless Seraphim jumping into the Meltus system and the task force over twelve hours away, there was no reason Florres shouldn’t have taken the bait and lie in wait for the Seraphim. The cargo was just too valuable and too easy to seize for Florres to ignore it, even if he had suspicions that it was a trap.
“Everything green?” Captain Moore asked the assembled captains. Each of them looked at their command consoles and reported that their ships were ready for the upcoming fight.
“We don’t know what we’ll find on the other side of this, but I want to remind everyone here about the physics of a battle. Believe it or not, these six ships are the largest task force mankind has assembled for combat in over six-hundred years. We have no fleet formations to follow, except for those created in the last war. Do not come out of the gate too fast, or you’ll overshoot your formation slots. Unless the pirate base is very close, the Sullivan squad will arrive first. Dakota will have to make some judgments about the situation and call out the battle orders.”
Dakota nodded. She was only in her late twenties, but she would be the first captain in centuries to have to figure out how to engage multiple enemy ships and a base’s defensive systems fast enough to neutralize them before they responded and crippled her ships. Pirates used multiple ships when they attacked a freighter, but it was usually waves of two or three strafing the freighter as they flew by. The pirates would time the waves so the first would have had time to turn around to make another strafing run as the last wave finished theirs. Dakota’s task was different, though: she needed to neutralize a fleet of pirate ships of various size and capabilities while quickly determining the capabilities of the pirate base and how to neutralize it at the same time. It had taken Cheyenne and her crew a full week to create a combat-ready AI, and there hadn’t been time to test the AI with the entire squadron. They would be going in with an untested AI and captains with very little to no experience in fleet-on-fleet combat maneuvers.
“Robert, are you sure you and your men are safe in the Seraphim?” Dakota asked.
“Yes. We had parts of it rebuilt over the week. I’ve added armor and beefed up the bridge door. I doubt Florres has anything that will damage us.”
“Florres will suspect something is up if they strafe you and nothing happens,” Captain Moore said.
“We added a few special effects to the Seraphim: we can make it look like she is being damaged, even when she is not. A little acting on our part and Florres will think he is damaging us, but we’ll be perfectly safe.”
“What about the bridge?” Dakota asked.
“They will have to spend some time cutting us out if they want us. I doubt they will even attempt to board, but my men have enough ammo to take on the whole pirate fleet if they do.”
“Good,” Captain Moore said. “Cheyenne, is your tracker ready?”
“Yes. I ran a diagnostic on it this morning and I am tracking the pods on the Seraphim right now. We’re in the green.”
“Okay. It might be a few hours before we know anything. I want full bridge crews on all ships and everyone ready to jump with no more than two minutes’ notice. Rotate crews and have the off-duty crews get some sleep, if they can. There’s no telling how long we’ll have before we go into battle.”
All six captains, Robert, and Lt. Davids agreed to Captain Moore’s command.
“Seraphim,” Captain Moore said into the com system, “you have the green light to go.”
“Copy that,” Robert replied.
“Seraphim is on the move,” Cheyenne called out.
******
It took the Seraphim ten hours in FTL to make it to Meltus. Robert knew the distances and the official schedule of the Seraphim. They were right on time and would come out of the FTL tunnel in the correct endpoint over Meltus. He and his team had been dealing with pirates for years and were not nervous about their roles. They all wished they were tasked with boarding the pirate’s base, but understood the need for the Terran Marines to fulfill that role. Robert only had a team of ten men and women, and even though they were all well-trained and equipped much better than any marine, a team of ten might be too small to take an entire pirate base.
“Hey, Cap,” someone said over the com system, “just how do we panic at the sight of a few junky pirate ships?”
“Based on your last performance, Olla, you should know better than me,” Robert joked right back. The team had a good laugh at the woman’s expense.
“I slipped,” Olla joked back. “That wasn’t panic, just a slippery floor.”
“None of the rest of us slipped,” Robert said, “but I’ll take your word for it.” He continued, “Listen up. We’re two minutes out. Report to your stations and prepare for exit.”
The Seraphim wasn’t built for combat and didn’t have enough internal dampers to overcome any maneuvering that might happen or the shock wave of any lucky strike the pirates might make, so everyone had to strap themselves to combat chairs installed around the ship. Two were in the Seraphim’s engine room, Robert and two others manned the bridge, and the remaining six were in various compartments near the bridge and would station themselves inside it if the pirates looked like they were going to board.
“Status?” Robert asked the team. He received ten reports of status green for the men.
“Olla, count it down.”
“Copy that,” the Seraphim’s pilot answered.
“Three, two, one,” she counted as the ship shook during its exit from the FTL tunnel.
******
King Florres watched as the FTL endpoint formed exactly where he was told it would be.
“Here she comes, boys. Fire ‘em up and move out,” he ordered the fifteen ships of his attack force.
Five waves of three ships formed behind where the Seraphim would exit the endpoint. The pirate crew was used to watching freighters slowly reveal themselves when they came out of an FTL tunnel. The shadow would remain until the ship fully exited the endpoint when the shadow would turn into the back end of a ship and its massive engines.
“Go,” King Florres order his men as he watched the Seraphim completely exit the FTL tunnel. A long time ago, someone had told him he shouldn’t try to destroy a ship until it was completely out of its endpoint, for the explosion would destroy space for hundreds of thousands of kilometers. Since he usually placed his attack force closer to the endpoint than that, Florres had never wanted to test the theory.
The first wave of three ships jumped forward and made their run. Just as they were starting to fire, Florres’ tactical officer shouted, “They’re screaming for help.”
Even though Robert had very powerful sensors on the Seraphim and knew exactly where the pirate force was located, he waited until the pirates made their first attack before acting like a freighter crew and contacting Meltus security to report the attack and ask for help. He would continue with basic operating procedures for a freighter under attack. Just in case Florres was listening in on their conversation, Robert would have his men report damage to the freighter as they faked it.
“Take it easy, boys. We only want to get their attention, not blow them out of the sky. There’s very valuable cargo on that sh
ip and I want it,” King Florres called out.
The first wave continued past the Seraphim as they finished their first, high-speed strafing run. As soon as the first wave rocketed past the Seraphim, the next started their attack run.
Robert let the first wave finish its attack and as the second started, he told the pilot to start making a ninety-degree turn and act like they were fleeing. Freighters like Seraphim had powerful engines, but when they were fully-loaded, turning them took some time. Robert knew the second and third wave of pirates would be able to strafe him before the Seraphim actually started the turn, and the fourth and fifth wave of pirates would have no trouble adjusting their courses to attack the Seraphim. Freighters couldn’t outrun or out-maneuver the smaller pirate ships, and both the freighter crew and the pirates knew it.
“Let the second wave pass and then start leaking a little atmo,” Robert ordered his pilot. “Make them think we are wounded.”
“Copy that,” the pilot replied. After the second pirate wave finished its run, he keyed in the command to have one of the special atmo containers they had installed on the ship to start leaking. The pirates would think they’d been successful in their first two runs.
“She’s leaking,” Florres’ pilot reported.
“Have the third wave continue, but slow up the fourth and fifth. Let’s see how damaged she is before attacking again,” Florres ordered.
As the third wave passed over the Seraphim, Robert had his pilot key in the fake damage subroutine. To the pirates, the ship’s engines would look damaged and a part of one of the cargo pods clamps destroyed. He had the pilot jettison a cargo pod to simulate the clamps failing.
“She’s done for,” King Florres reported to his men. “Hold up the attack and let’s see if her crew will haul to.”
“Slow down and act like we’re holed and the engines are damaged,” Robert ordered his pilot. “Make your maneuvers sloppy.”
“There she goes,” Florres reported. “Fourth and fifth waves, start moving in and let’s see if she’ll dump her cargo.”
“Jettison the pods,” Robert commanded his pilot. “Start your escape maneuver. Let’s see if they’ll let us go.”
“Want us to go in and board her?” the leader of Florres’ fourth attack wave asked.
“No, let her go. Start picking up those cargo pods and let’s go home,” King Florres responded.
The Seraphim slowly limped away while the pirates were occupied with the cargo pods. When they were far enough from the pirates, Robert had his pilot create an FTL tunnel. Just before they entered, he sent an encoded message to Dakota that the pirates had taken the bait and that the Seraphim was undamaged and making its way to Petrus. They would be out of FTL in five hours if needed.
Chapter 5
Captain Dakota Sullivan stood looking at the main view screen in the bridge of Sullivan’s Pride. She wished it was an actual window, but a window would only weaken the hull. With the Sullivan’s Pride and the rest of her ships going into combat, a strong hull was more important than a window.
She looked at the six ships in formation over Taurus Prime—six ships with over two-hundred and forty sailors and one-hundred and fifty marines. It wasn’t even large enough to be called a task force by the standards of the last war, but it was a large one by modern standards. Dakota felt her sister, Cheyenne, walk up to stand next to her.
“What do you think?” Dakota asked. “Will this work?”
“It should,” Cheyenne said. “My teams have run enough tests and simulations that I can assure you of the tracker’s ability and reliability.”
“That’s not what I meant. Do you think we can defeat a pirate fleet and capture a pirate base?”
“Between the two of us, yes. I started a project a few months ago to modify a standard ship AI to operate during combat. I wanted a combat AI to help predict the pirate’s responses and to help determine priority targets.”
“I’ve never heard anything about a combat AI in our briefings,” Dakota said.
“I never made it an official Sullivan Shipping project. It was more of a hobby.”
“Okay, then tell me what your little hobby can do.”
“I went through all the combat scenarios I could find in the Terran Naval Archive database and used them to help program the AI. The project moved pretty quickly, and when I programmed the AI with modern ships and technology, it predicted that we have a seventy-five percent chance of success.”
“When were you going to tell us about the AI and its prediction?”
“When I was sure it was accurate.”
“You mean after you used the data from this battle to run more tests?”
“Yes. I needed real data to test the AI’s abilities.”
“I can live with a seventy-five percent chance of us winning. Did it output any suggestions on how to alter our battle plan?”
“It did, but I discarded them as unusable.”
“Why?”
“It recommended holding off on the attack until we had more intelligence about the pirate’s fleet and base. The AI recommended a scouting mission, first, and then the creation of battle plans from the data obtained from the scouts. It also said we should have more ships in our task force since we don’t know the actual capabilities of the pirate fleet or their base.”
“We don’t have time for scouting missions.”
“I know.”
“If the AI comes up with something new, tell me. I don’t care what the suggestion is—I want to know. I’ll make my own decision.”
“I’d be glad to let the combat AI offer anything that might save lives. I hate going into something like this unprepared. It’s been too long since anyone faced something like this pirate fleet, and I feel that our people are not equipped well enough for this mission. I just didn’t have time to do anything else.”
Dakota leaned over and gave her sister a hug. “I know, but that’s how it is sometimes. We don’t always have all the information or equipment we need. We just have to push through and use everything at our disposal to get the job done. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. That’s what makes life interesting.”
Cheyenne was about to reply, but her tracking unit lets out a small ding. “The tracking unit stopped moving. I’m pinpointing the location.”
Dakota opened a channel to Captain Moore and Cheyenne spoke, “Captain, the coordinates are in the Archimedes Asteroid Field. My database tells me there’s an abandoned Archimedes Mining Company mining station, AMS-245, at these coordinates. The pirates must be using it as a base.”
“That’s it!” Captain Moore exclaimed. “I’ve seen one of those stations, and they are perfect for what Florres needs for a base.”
“I’ve found schematics of this exact station,” Cheyenne said. “Sending them now.”
“Good work. Make sure Lt. Davids has them, so he can adjust his assault plan,” Captain Moore said.
“More data coming in. The nearest endpoint is only a ten minutes’ flight from the station.”
“I estimate that the base is four hours FTL time from here,” Dakota added.
“Based on our speeds, you’ll get there approximately fifteen minutes before we do,” Captain Moore said. “Captain Sullivan, you’ll have to hold off the pirates for at least twenty-five minutes before we can engage. When you drop out of FTL, make any changes to our battle plans that you see fit and be prepared to send me updates once I clear the FTL endpoint. I’ll come as fast as I can.”
“Understood,” Dakota said.
“I recommend that you destroy any ships orbiting the station and then any that are docked. We can take on the base after we destroy the pirates’ ability to flee. We don’t know what defensives they’ve added to that station, but I doubt the station has any defensive capabilities. Pirates usually flee, instead of fighting, and Florres’ plans probably involve fleeing and regrouping somewhere else. Besides, based on my past dealings with Florres, he doesn’t trust anyone and wouldn’t want wea
pons on the station that someone could turn on him.”
“I agree with your assessment,” Dakota said. “We’ll engage the fleet and try to destroy any docked ships. If there is time, I’ll scan the station to determine defenses and wait for you, if I feel it is too highly defended.”
“Understood. Also, most pirate ships are going to be too small to be boarded, but the Anarchy is larger. They may have other larger ships in the fleet, as well, and we may have to use some of the marines to board disabled vessels. Task a drop ship for boarding actions. They can join the main assault force after they clear any disabled ships.”