by Dietmar Wehr
“May I see the report?” asked Molitor. Drake handed over the data tablet. It was clear from her flipping through the pages that she was looking for something specific. When she found it, she nodded. “As you know, the Coral Sea already has the detection system and ECM system installed. The engineers have already added the control linkages for laser turrets. Installing the x-ray turrets themselves would only take another five weeks, and if we decided to go with just one superluminal turret, we could have that installed within one more week. So Coral Sea could be ready to lift off in six weeks. That’s a lot sooner than the projection for all five carriers since the other four still need some of the upgrade work that Coral Sea already has.”
Before she could go on, Drake interjected. “Hold on, Rachel. You can’t seriously be thinking of trying to win the war with just one ship.”
She smiled and shook her head. “No, of course not. But one ship might be enough to derail Empire efforts to bomb Earth with bio-weapons. I can’t see Majestic concentrating its entire fleet in order to use bio-weapons. One ship, maybe two, should be enough, and if those ships aren’t expecting to fight a ship-to-ship action, I’ll have the element of surprise. I’ll have to get within a million klicks or less in order to aim the superluminal accurately, but I think I can pull it off.”
“What if they fire missiles with Ether homing systems?” asked Drake.
After a pause to consider her reply, she said, “Well, if I have enough time, I can take my ship out of the hyper-zone, position it so that the Empire ships are silhouetted against the Earth, and then I should be able to hit them with the superluminal and micro-jump away if they fire missiles at me.”
She sounded confident that she could pull it off, but Drake wasn’t as certain. Having enough time to get into that firing position would take luck as well as skill. On the other hand, if she could pull it off, Majestic would not suspect that its ships had failed until months later when they would be overdue. During those months, additional upgraded carriers could rendezvous with Coral Sea in Earth orbit as they became available. In terms of risk, it wasn’t as low a risk as he would have liked, but it certainly lowered the risk of arriving at Earth too late to prevent the bombardment.
“Okay, I’ll let you take Coral Sea when she’s ready, BUT I want her to have two superluminal laser turrets, not just one. This is new technology, but it’s also new engineering, and if you only have one and are about to go into battle and it suffers a malfunction, you’ll be in serious trouble. Two turrets will take a bit longer, but I’m prepared to accept that delay.”
“Thank you, Ro. That extra turret will let me sleep easier.”
Drake understood her point as he nodded, but he doubted if the extra delay would let him sleep easier.
Seven weeks later:
It was a cold, miserable day when Coral Sea was finally finished and ready to lift off. Drake and Lorelei drove out to the ship with Molitor. Her crew were already on board and were getting the ship powered up for departure. As the three of them stepped out of the vehicle, they felt the freezing rain hit their exposed faces. Stepping over to the boarding ramp, Drake extended his hand, and Molitor took it. After a brief shake, the two women gave each other a quick hug. Molitor nodded to Drake as she turned and walked rapidly up the ramp. They hadn’t spoken a single word, because none was necessary. Drake was shivering and not just because of the cold. Getting the ship ready had taken longer than anticipated. He was already regretting his insistence on the second superluminal laser, but by the time the extended delay was obvious, it was too late to change anything. He also hated the fact that he was staying behind. With a capable commanding officer like Molitor available, he couldn’t justify going himself. This was not a touchy contact mission like his trip to Midgard. This was a simple defensive patrol of Earth, and after facing Molitor in simulated combat a few times, he was willing to admit, if only to himself, that she was the better tactician. Molitor was the right person for the job, and Lorelei was happy that he was staying on the ground.
As the two of them got ready to get back into the vehicle, Drake looked over to the shipyard where the Leyte Gulf was in the process of having her weapons turrets installed. The third carrier, Gambier Bay, was further away and was being equipped with the Ether detection and ECM systems. He took some comfort from the knowledge that work on the other four carriers should go faster due to the experience gained in working the kinks out on Coral Sea. Once both of them were back inside the vehicle, Drake ordered the auto-pilot system to take them a safe distance away. Normally there was nothing dangerous in being close when a large ship lifted off, but the freezing rain made this a special situation. The ship was now covered with a layer of ice. This did not put the ship itself in any danger; however, when Coral Sea broke the sound barrier, which she would do quickly and relatively close to the ground, the sonic boom would shatter the ice into a cascade of millions of fragments with sharp edges and points. Drake had only seen that kind of thing happen once before and from a much farther distance. It was an awesome sight, and he wasn’t going to miss seeing this one.
It didn’t take long for the vehicle to reach a safe distance. Despite his urgings, Lorelei was adamant that she was staying inside the vehicle, thank you very much, even if that meant not having a good view of the ice cascade. Drake got out and put on a pair of goggles to protect his eyes from the freezing rain so that he could get a good look at the ship’s lift off. In the distance, he heard the warning siren that lift off was imminent. It reminded him of that day, so many years ago now, when he took command of Sparta’s first missile boat during the almost bungled takeover of Federation military assets and the interception of the FED courier ship.
Even though he was watching the ship carefully, the 5G lift off still surprised him. He counted the seconds. When the count reached six, he heard a tremendously loud boom and saw what looked like a white veil fall from the ship. The veil looked solid, but only because of the distance. He watched in fascination as the veil continued moving up due to its accumulated momentum before stopping for just a second, and then it started to fall. The illusion of solidity quickly evaporated, and the veil turned into an expanding cloud of white, glittering particles. When the cloud hit the ground, he actually heard the muffled sound of the impact. The ship had already penetrated the overhead cloud cover and was no longer visible. Drake got back inside the vehicle and listened to the sound of the freezing rain hitting the roof of the groundcar for a few seconds before ordering the auto-pilot to take them back to the Operations Center where hot drinks would be waiting for them.
“Good luck, Rachel,” said Lorelei in a barely audible voice.
Day 114/2556
Coral Sea
Earth orbital space:
Molitor was standing beside the Communications Station when Coral Sea emerged from its final micro-jump. She didn’t need the Com Tech to tell her that they were already picking up lots of audio and video transmissions from Earth. Her initial impulse was to heave a sigh of relief that they hadn’t found a devastated planet. The sense of relief quickly turned to horror as she watched video footage of what seemed to be newscasts showing large numbers of people dying from some kind of infection.
She closed her eyes which were quickly tearing up. Coral Sea had gotten here too late. Given the fact that the bio-weapon hadn’t yet run its course, not much time could have passed since it had been dropped. If she had gotten the ship here even just a few days sooner, they might have been able to prevent the attack. She looked around the makeshift Bridge and saw that the others were also watching the newscasts. The Bridge was as quiet as a tomb. She mentally shook herself out of her sense of failure and turned to the Com Tech.
“See if you can contact someone at Federation HQ for me,” she said in a low voice. It took almost a full minute before the main display shifted from tactical to the face of a man wearing the uniform of the Federation Army.
“Who are you?” he demanded in a voice that sounded on the verge of pani
c.
“I’m Rachel Molitor in command of the Coral Sea. We’re not Empire if that’s what’s worrying you. We’re here to help if we can. I take it from your newscasts that the Empire attacked Earth with a bio-weapon.” She knew that at this distance, there would be a 34 second delay for her transmission to reach Earth and for any reply to get back to her.
“Attack…yes! That happened five days ago. The Empire ships fired missiles at about a hundred cities. The warheads exploded in the air. We suspected that they were carrying biological agents, and we tried to evacuate those cities, but we obviously didn’t get everyone out in time, and now the damn stuff is spreading like wildfire. Unless you’ve brought a cure, I don’t see what help you can give us.”
She waited to make sure that he was finished speaking and then shook her head. “No cure, I’m sorry to say, but maybe there’s something else we can help with. Has it become widely known that General Masterson, Admiral Chenko and some of the top people in the Federation administration have been compromised with mind-controlling devices implanted at the back of their necks?”
“Are you serious?” asked the man after the required delay. “No, there’s been no news of anything like that! I can’t believe what you’re telling me. I just talked to General Masterson this morning, and he seemed fine.”
“Tell me something, Captain. Was Masterson in charge of the city evacuations? If so, do you think he could have acted more aggressively in your opinion?” asked Molitor.
When the 34 seconds were up, she saw the army captain’s eyes open wide with realization. Clearly she had guessed right.
“Oh God! He did seem to be taking the whole situation less seriously than I thought he should have! It took us hours to convince him to order the evacuations. None of us could understand his attitude, and now that I think of it, Admiral Chenko wasn’t enthusiastic about the evacuation either. We’ve got to stop them. Who else has been compromised?”
Moltior gave him the names of the half a dozen top Federation politicians that Rollens had volunteered. She warned him that any compromised person they tried to arrest would very likely turn violent and would display unusual speed and strength. She also told him that she could provide several electro-magnetic pulse devices that would deactivate the implants. She was prepared to load them onto a shuttle that could be sent down via auto-pilot. She wasn’t going to risk any of her crew becoming contaminated. The Captain could keep the shuttle. The Captain thanked her, and after telling her where the shuttle should land, signed off with a promise to report back to her later.
It was over five hours later before she heard back from the army captain. Coral Sea, meanwhile, had maintained its position outside Earth’s hyper-zone to be on the safe side in case more Empire ships arrived. When the Captain’s face re-appeared on the display, she could see that he had a bandage over the left side of his forehead.
“You were right about their strength, Commander,” he said in an apologetic voice. “General Masterson managed to seriously injure one of our security personnel, plus this,” he pointed to his forehead, “before we could subdue him. Who would have thought a man his age could move so fast! It took some doing, but we arrested everyone you mentioned and confirmed that they were all implanted. We discovered some others who were implanted too. Everybody in a position of authority is being checked for implants now. By the way, your shuttle landed okay, and we’ve already tested the pulse equipment on Admiral Chenko. It worked just as you predicted. In fact, the Admiral’s on his way here, and he’ll want to talk with you when he gets here. Over to you, Commander.”
“I’m standing by, Captain. We’ll keep this channel open. Thanks for the update.” It didn’t take long for the Admiral to appear. He looked considerably older than the last time she saw him.
“Commander Molitor, I want to express my personal thanks for bringing that pulse equipment. I thought that nightmare was never going to end. Captain Fernandez has told me what little he knows about your situation. What else can you tell me?”
“Well, Admiral, the shipbuilding operation on Midgard has been evacuated to Excalbur, where the SSU Brain Trust is located. We’re in the process of modifying former rebel ships with some new weapon technology that we think can beat the Empire. Unfortunately, the Empire has the new Ether detection system. We tried to get here as fast as we could, but technical problems delayed our departure. I’m sorry we couldn’t get here in time to prevent the bio-attack, Admiral.”
Chenko nodded. “I’m sorry too, Commander, but all you can do is all you can do. I regret to report that the bio-weapon is spreading out of control. Our projections indicate that ninety per cent of Earth’s population will be dead within ten days and ninety-eight per cent two weeks after that. The damn thing won’t kill us all of course. There are enough isolated places that some people will survive, but civilization will disappear from this planet. Other planets too, unfortunately. When I was still under the control of my implant, I ordered five ships that were on Earth to carry infected cargo to as many planets as they could reach. Majestic is continuing to send its own ships to bombard planets, but it’s counting on secondary distribution via commercial freighters to do most of the damage. Those ship commanders have all been implanted too, so they’re not going to stop as long as they’re still alive. I wish there was some way we could intercept those five ships, but they’ll get to their destinations before anyone can stop them. Over to you, Commander.”
Molitor was shocked by the news, but it all made perfect sense. Freighters could spread the bio-weapon much farther and faster than sending Empire cruisers to every one of the over 500 colonized planets in existence. It suddenly dawned on her that Chenko clearly didn’t know about the improved hyper-drive technology that Rebel ships had. Coral Sea could definitely beat at least one, maybe even two ships to their destinations. If Leyte Gulf got here soon enough, it might be able to intercept two more, and Gambier Bay might be able to get the fifth ship, but it would all depend on where those ships were going and how long it would take them to get there. Any interception effort would have to be planned very carefully.
“Admiral, there’s a chance we can stop those five ships. There’s one secret that I don’t think the Empire knows about yet. The SSU made a major breakthrough in FTL technology right at the end of the war, although too late to prevent defeat. Coral Sea can cross interstellar space four point six three times faster than your standard hyper-drive. We can beat one ship there and intercept it and maybe get to a second destination before that infected ship arrives. Four more Resistance ships will be arriving here over the next few weeks. They can be redirected to try to stop the other three. Your people will have to figure out a deployment plan that has the best chance of stopping the infected ships. I estimate Leyte Gulf will get here in about fifteen days or so. Not sure about when the other three ships will arrive. Over to you, Admiral.” The 34 seconds between messages now seemed twice as long as she anxiously waited for his reply.
“That’s the best news I’ve heard in a long time, Commander! I’ll get my staff to work on the optimum deployment plan. I just hope the bio-weapon doesn’t wipe us out here at HQ before we can figure out the answer. We’ll get back to you, Commander. Chenko out.”
Coral Sea received the deployment plan digitally five and a half hours later along with a text message. Molitor felt her eyes tear up as she read it on a data tablet.
Chenko to Molitor. HQ has been infected now. Staff dropping like flies. I’m feeling sick too. Our orbiting comsats will broadcast the plan continuously in order to inform your other ships what to do when they get here because none of us will still be alive by then. Good luck. End of message.
By the time she finished reading the message, her Astrogator had already put the deployment plan up on the main display. The five infected ships were heading out in widely divergent directions and to far away destinations. The shortest trip would still take just over 13 weeks, and the longest trip, 18.5 weeks. Coral Sea and Leyte Gulf were virtually c
ertain of arriving at the target colonies first and intercepting those two plague ships. The plan had the latest dates that the other three carriers could arrive at Earth and still beat the plague ships to their target systems. Based on when the shipyard on Excalibur thought those last three carriers would be ready, there was a chance that they would make it here in time, but it would be close. All five carriers were to return to Earth orbit for rendezvous after their interceptions were completed. Coral Sea’s target was Dresden. Without needing to be ordered to do so, the Astrogator had the course for Dresden calculated and transferred over to the Helm Station. Molitor gave the order to head for Dresden.