We should have returned to the dry dock for a month after the Arnos Cluster.
ANS Relentless had taken a beating; there was no argument there. And though the exterior damaged had been fixed, there was always the possibility something much more serious lay yet to be discovered. But with each report it showed that the ship had beaten the odds. Over three hundred square metres of armour plate had been replaced, and nearly a kilometre of new wiring. More impressive, this had all been done in situ, all while the rest of the fleet assembled for the operation.
"The ship is tougher than I had expected. Your engineers are to be commended," said Captain Dreuc.
Captain Galanos nodded politely. She suspected it was an attempt to placate her after what had become an uncomfortable conversation.
You're a tough girl, a seriously tough girl. But are we ready for battle again?
The display showed all manner of technical details, but the imagery of the starboard view she found entrancing. Contrary to popular imagination, travelling at high-speed had little effect on the surrounding star fields. There was minor discernible difference in the background to when she'd checked ten minutes earlier. The Captain's attention was not on the cold void of space, but on the flotilla of ships.
Where are we going, Churchill?
None of those aboard the ship had a clue as to what the mission was. The one thing Captain Galanos did know was their destination. She looked to her wrist where a tactical map popped up. She'd kept the details hidden from the others, but based on their current trajectory it was clear where they were going. A small ring pulsed away representing the location of one of the permanent Spacebridges that connected star systems together. As she looked at it, her pulse quickened.
That is the Spacebridge that leads to the outer worlds of the Trinity, the heart of the Byotai Empire.
The Captain had never travelled inside the Trinity, but like all Naval captains, she was only too familiar with the stories about the place. The Byotai used the name as an honorific title for the three primary star systems, or quadrants as they knew them. These three regions comprised the richest, oldest, and most important colonies of the entire Byotai Empire. Once through the Rift, they would be able to travel to any of the nearby planets, or make use of the local Spacebridges to travel to each of the three star systems.
"What are you up to, Churchill?
* * *
The other four were long gone by the time Nate had finished with the computer display. Pages of personnel profiles flashed by, and as he tapped those of interest, they transferred their data to his Secpad bracelet. It took so long that by the time he left the room, he realised there were only four minutes to make the trip, one that would take easily double if he walked.
You idiot. What's the point in getting all the data, if you miss the simulation?
Nate moved from a fast walk to a jog, and then to a sprint. It was a long, meandering route through to get to where he friends were waiting. As he ran through the ship, he almost crashed into a pair of marines. The first leaned to one side, but in avoiding the second, he hit the wall with a thud. Luckily, it was a bare section with no exposed bulkheads or piping, or the impact might have landed him in the med bay for the duration of the mission.
"Hey, slow down, Cadet. No running through the ship."
Nate acknowledged and then walked away. As soon as the marines were out of sight, he increased speed. He was only a hundred metres away and could already see the last two OTC cadets rounding a corner. They were a little older than he was, but there seemed to be no sign of professional courtesy.
"Wait for me!"
The last of the group looked to Nate and then shook his head muttering something. Then they were gone, and it was just Nate running as fast as he could. He ran around the corner and right into trouble.
"Watch out, idiot."
The voice was smooth but unfriendly, and as Nate ran past the last cadet, he almost ran into the individual. He tried to right himself, but to his surprise the young man had turned around and moved to the side of the passageway with a subtle spin. At the same time, he pushed out his knee.
Not good!
Nate was moving so fast that he struck the exposed leg and tumbled head over heel in a mess of flailing arms and legs. He hit the ground hard and managed to almost knock himself out on the metal flooring due to the speed. By the time he looked up, the others were gone, but he could easily make out the sound of their laughter as they made it to the last passageway section before the entrance to the suite. Then Nate spotted the red patch on the floor. He sat up and lifted his hands to his face. A quick check revealed no major injury, but there was certainly a light cut to his forehead.
"Great job, Nate. Making friends as usual."
With no first aid kit to hand, he elected to lifting his left hand to his face and putting pressure on the cut. It stung to the touch, but besides that, he found no other side effects. With a concerted effort, he rose to his feet, shook his head, and then ran on to his destination.
The door was wide open as he stepped inside. Over a dozen pairs of eyes looked back at him, but not one showed any sign or acknowledgement of what had just happened. Nate was livid, and his gut told him to go right to the commanding officer of the operation. To his surprise, only Commander Higgins was there. He had expected to find the new commanding officers of the two Lightning squadrons to be present.
"About time," said Commander Higgins.
He looked up to the digital clock counting down. Somehow Nate had managed it to the minute, and by his reckoning had just fifteen seconds remaining.
"Sorry, Sir. I was held up by..."
It doesn't matter. Let it go. There'll be plenty of time.
"...uh, some trouble at the third storage level."
Commander Higgins did not looked particularly convinced. Nate glanced around the large open space and found most of the pods were occupied. With a signal from the Commander, he walked along the open space between them, glancing at each pod. A few of the OTC cadets watched him walk past, but not one of them said a word to him. He tried to find the one responsible for his little accident, but with all of them now wearing helmets and visors, it was next to impossible. Even so, as he passed a number stared at him, and two even lifted their visors to get a good look at his bruised and bloodied forehead.
Great, they look friendly.
Screens above them showed their fighters waiting on the launch rails. It might just as easily have been a live drone mission. As it was, this was a simulation, but the consequences were going to be great to those piloting the simulated gunships.
"Flight Cadet Lewis, it is time. To your pod, if you will."
As usual Commander Higgins was waiting at the pit in the centre of the control suite and resting both of his hands on the unit. He looked uncomfortable, no doubt at least partially due to the pain caused by his still not fully healed injuries. With one hand, he motioned off behind him where a few pods were still empty.
"Nate...here!" Billy called out.
Nate moved quickly past the Commander to the pod adjacent to Billy's.
"Where were you?"
Nate leaned over his friend and then tapped his Secpad bracelet. Billy was more interested in the marks on Nate's face.
"What happened? You've cut your face."
Nate shrugged and again looked to the Secpad. An image popped up showing multiple faces. For a second Billy had absolutely no idea what he was looking at.
"Uh...yeah?"
Commander Higgins started to speak, so Nate leaned in closer and lowered his voice.
"I used access to the local rosters and downloaded all of their squadron records. I've got simulator stats, specialism, and experience. Everything we need to know to get the skinny on their unit."
Billy shook his head while lifting his eyebrows in surprise.
"So what? How is knowing their weight or age going to help us?"
Now it was Nate's turn to grin and he looked at his friend.
> "Billy, I know who their best two pilots are, and who their slackers are. We have an advantage, a major advantage, and I intend on using it."
"Pilots. Prepare yourselves," said Commander Higgins.
The pilots checked their harnesses and then pulled their visors down over their eyes. In seconds the interior of the room vanished, to be replaced by a series of launch rails aboard their ships. Nate settled into his own pod and pressed the series of buttons to the side. The unit adjusted to match his pre-recorded settings. Height, lumbar support, and angles were all subtly altered to give him the most comfortable and supportive seating position possible. It was equally important that all the simulated gunships controls were close to hand.
"This is a simple test to gauge your individual skill levels, as well as those when working as a team. We've got twelve pilots here, and you will be split into two teams."
Nate watched with fascination as each of his comrades was allocated a designation on the IFF system. One by one they popped up along the bottom left in green. As before Nate was classed as Crusader Three. The enemy team were all marked in red, even though technically they were all Alliance pilots and flying the same gunships."
"OTC pilots, your designation is Gold Squadron. Five of you will pilot Bullnose gunships, two will operate as weapons officers," said Commander Higgins.
He tagged each of them on the system, allocating them their roles.
"Your missing gunnery officers will be played by bots, giving each of you the chance to all participate as pilots."
He then moved to Nate's squadron.
"Crusader Squadron. There are only five of you, so each will pilot a single Bullnose. Bots will function as your weapons officers."
The view inside the visor darkened and all external sounds was blocked off by the white-noise hardware. In just a few seconds the illusion of being inside a spacecraft was once more all too real.
"Gold and Crusader Squadrons. This is the classic base defence scenario, using mapping data from the New Carlos Spaceport on Prime. Each squadron has a single base and launch pad to guard against attack. The five highest scoring pilots will form the initial duty roster for the five Bullnose gunships on board Relentless, the rest will join a rotating weapons officer roster."
Nate licked his lips in anticipation. As in most of these simulated engagements, the spacecraft were inside armoured hangars and hidden from their outside view. This was to match the reality of combat operations, as well as to give the simulator a moment to generate the scenario, along with a fully mapped terrain and environment.
"Get ready. Twenty seconds on the clock. Now!"
The outer doors slid open, and Nate was granted a view of the surface of Proxima Prime. He had no idea if this was taken from modern imagery, or of that before the fighting in the Great Uprising so many decades earlier. He knew from his history classes that large parts of the city and spaceport had been devastated in major ground combat.
"Look at it," said Nate, "It's incredible."
The planet was one of the Alliance's more populous and featured raised rail systems and tall structures. It was a sophisticated world, and right now it was taking a beating from a major storm. Rain lashed down, striking the ground and buildings with equal gusto. For all the beauty of the view, the heavy rain and dark clouds made the mission much more difficult.
"Cut the chatter, Crusader Three," said Rex, "It's time to plan the mission. We have two bases, each on opposite sides of the spaceport, and five enemy gunships to deal with."
Matilda took over as the counter continued to drop down.
"Each base is defended by a pair of auto-tracking defence turrets. The weather will reduce our visual range by at least fifty percent. We do not know the proficiency levels of the other team, so I...
"Not true," interrupted Nate.
Even as Matilda continued to speak, Nate was running his eyes along the skyline. Arced lightning flashed across the sky, and with each strike, the cityscape flickered black as a dark silhouette. Lights down on the ground marked the many roads, lanes, and rail tracks; red dots highlighted the taller structures. New Carlos City was certainly a jewel in the Alliance, made more so by the appalling damage across the planets of the Helion Nexus, thousands of light years away.
We might have done a lot of the fighting, but it wasn't us that suffered the most in that war. Look at this place. The Helions can only dream of something like this.
It was something Nate had never given much thought to before. His uncle died in the last moments of the war, giving up his life in a massive space battle. So many relatives had played their part, yet for all the violence and loss in the Alliance, they had been spared the ravages of the war.
"What?" Rex asked.
His tone was matched by his increased volume. The countdown was still ticking away, and they still had no basic strategy in place. While the others complained, Nate connected to his Secpad unit and uploaded the images of each of the OTC cadets. There was much more information on the system now, with a full computer-assessed ranking of their skills. It was something Nate had left running as he made his way to the control suite.
"According to their stats, one of them, this Flight Lieutenant Bartholomew Hawkins, the Third, is the highest scoring simulator pilot in the Primus College Officer Training School."
The other four might have been surprised at what they saw, but with time of the essence, none asked him the obvious question. Once again, this was a classic case of a group that knew each other well. Nate and Billy might resent or even dislike Rex, but when it came to simulated combat, they just worked.
"Ten seconds, people. Decide, and fast!" said Rex, "Remember, they've flown these ships before. We haven't."
"True, but they don't know us," said Nate.
Even as he said the words, he came to the awful realisation that no matter how clever he thought he'd been, it was just as likely their opponents could have done exactly the same to them. He swallowed uncomfortably.
Well, you'd better hope none of them are as sneaky as you.
Nate then selected the top three in their team and tagged their call signs.
"They are all ranked. I suggest we ignore the mission and the bases, and stack the odds in our favour. We can use this information to our advantage."
There was silence for a few seconds, and then Cassandra spoke.
"We don't know what these gunships are really like. Not until we test them for real. I agree with Nate. We must use the numbers to our advantage."
Nate's expression softened as he listened to their analytical member.
"Exactly. Based on this data, I say we head for their formation head on, and then on Rex's signal we destroy their lead fighter."
"And then?" asked Rex.
Nate laughed.
"If we can manage that, we can easily finish off the other four."
Matilda chimed in with just a few seconds remaining on the clock. They had already removed the safety from their weapons and began running the turrets through their test rotations. There was always a chance one of them could jam, and that the maintenance crews had left the locks in place. This might be a simulation, but that was no reason to avoid checking. Part of any good simulation was to include as many potential problems as possible. Anything from human error through to failures in metallurgy all made the simulation more realistic.
"Statistically our best chance for success it to stack the numbers in our favour. You'll recall the class on Lanchester and the formulae for calculating the relative strengths of predator and prey pairs?"
Cassandra's answer came back quickly.
"Yes, of course. I agree. We need to reduce the number of opponents as quickly as possible."
"Quite," said Matilda, "So we will need to remove the weakest members first. With careful positioning, we can reduce them from five down to three. By doing this we stack the odds to us with five versus three."
Billy listened to all of this with confused interest. He remembered the class, and e
ven some of the formulae, but he couldn't draw the conclusions as quickly as they could. Instead he closed his eyes and added up the numbers in his head. His eyes opened at the realisation of what had just occurred.
"The odds will increase at least three to one in our favour."
Matilda sounded irritated as she blocked Billy's audio. It was much more than having to listen to Billy's attempt at exposition, it was more down to his inability to perform basic analysis on relatively simple data sets. Matilda worked on specifics, not on guesses, and Billy's lack of understanding annoyed her.
"Using the information from Nate, we can increase our chances of success before dealing with their best pilots. Time will be critical, and every extra second will give them a chance to even the fight."
She then altered the order of their opponents on their visor overlays.
"Assuming skills are equal between those left, that would shift the odds within an order of twenty-five for us, versus nine for them. Provided we can remove two from their formation with no losses to us. These two are statistically their weakest and least experienced pilots."
Each might have had their own ideas, but none could absorb and analyse data as fast as Matilda. While Nate and Rex voiced their belief in eliminating the best their opponents had to offer, they could also see the simple numbers. One by one, they agreed until it was finally down to Rex.
"Okay, it's settled then. We knock off the weakest first."
"And if this Hawkins comes gunning for us? His numbers are off the charts."
Nate checked his engine settings as he answered. Even as the others spoke, he had been checking the faces of the other pilots. It was clear to him the individual that had sent him crashing to the floor was none other than Bartholomew Hawkins.
"I'll keep him occupied for as long as you need."
"You're sure?" Rex asked, "We need him kept busy, but we'll need your guns if we're to win this thing. The real wildcard is how much better they are at flying these gunships. Losing your ship will not help us."
Star Crusader: Knighthawk Squadron Page 10