“Take us in, ahead one quarter on both,” Leharl ordered quietly, watching the tactical map on the main display. “Come left to three-four-two mark zero.”
The helmscat pushed his controls over slightly, small thrusters on the bow of the Fel’s Wrath streaming silvery vapor to alter her course. Behind him, Letha sat at her station, watching the three-dimensional holographic representation of the radar and laser sensor arcs searching for them. In her display, they appeared as bubbles and wands of light, fading from areas of red ‘definite detect’ to the yellow of ‘possible detect’. At the moment they were staying in the black shadow of an outer planet’s moon, with sweeps of yellow reaching past them deep into space. On her lap, almost unnoticed, the small silver-and-brown cat Teal’c sat. His attention was also fixed on the display, and Letha had her personal opinion that he might not be just watching the moving colours.
Leharl looked over and grinned when he saw Teal’c, watching for a moment before breaking Letha’s intent concentration on the ESM display with a question. “Letha, have you been able to pick up any gaps we can exploit yet?”
“Not yet, captain, give me another hour and I might have something for you.”
“Oh well,” Leharl sighed, “it was worth a hope for an easy shot, I suppose.” He glanced over at the Fire Control Officer, sitting at his console with his attention focused on some task or another, and smiled grimly. Less than a week before he had been forced to bring thermonuclear fire to bear upon the one planet in the sector that he considered a pastoral resting place for himself and his crew, and he was more than a little bit peeved about that. His judgment on the subject may have been shaded a small amount, he admitted to himself, by the not-insignificant risk to one of three people in the universe that he considered a friend. Another mile closer and the overpressure could have injured Azrael seriously; never mind the possible flash radiation. He snarled slightly under his breath, his claws poking at the covers of his armrests. His statement about that treaty-breaking landing on the protectorate planet was nestled safely in missile tubes seven and eight, in the form of a pair of SkyFire cruise missiles. The third planet in the Omicron-Beta system was a major mining and shipfitting outpost for the Na-Drk, probably the one responsible for the colony ship’s final fitout and resupply before its jump to the protectorate system.
“Bridge, CIC” the speakers said, “We are showing a pair of passive sensor contacts on a trajectory outsystem that will bring them in close to our position. No sign they see us, sir, they look like a pair of cargo-haulers on an outbound run.”
“Very well, CIC, keep an eye on them and report at once if they change course.” Leharl drummed his fingertips on the armrest of his seat. So many things could go wrong with this, but the message that the FSF would not tolerate incursions had to be delivered. His previous plan, though quickly thought up, had been much simpler, and would have worked just fine if not for an unfortunately-competent engineer on the Na-Drk pod carrier. The fighter’s abortive missile attack had gone off without a hitch, and the assault pod had been successfully sent back to the carrier by the explosion of the self-destructed missile’s warhead. It was almost back-patting time when the engineers on the pod carrier had managed to reactivate their radar system, and detected Fel’s Wrath hanging just beyond visual range. In their haste to escape the perceived threat, they had made their run out of the system with only partial navigation data, and blundered straight into a large asteroid. The asteroid was not impressed, but the hull of the pod carrier was impressed very thoroughly, right back to the drive section, which subsequently exploded.
Letha watched the ESM display carefully as the computer slowly drew a map of the radar and laser signals in the area, comparing time and scan rate to hopefully find a flaw in the coverage they could exploit. It would only take a moment, she knew, to send the missile on its lethal journey. After a few moments of staring at the screen, she noticed a peculiarity in the scan rate of one of the sensor drones set on the outer edge of the system. Every third scan, it seemed that the beam scanned higher than the previous two, perhaps an old or out-of-synch antenna. By itself, it was not enough, but maybe with a little creative work on the jamming packages… She turned to Leharl. “Captain, I might have a path for the missiles.
Leharl looked up and nodded. “What do you have?”
“Well, it’s not much, but one of their outer perimeter drones seems to be a little bit out of alignment with the others. If we can pencil-jam one of the sensors flanking it, I think we can get a missile through undetected.” She flipped a switch, putting her display on the main screen, and used her cursor to trace a path across the multicolored bubbles that represented the enemy sensor perimeters. “If we target the missile to fly between these two satellites, sir, and keep it low to the planet’s atmosphere, I THINK it will be nearly undetectable with their sensors, captain. We’ll fire it on a slow speed setting and let it accelerate down the planet’s gravity well, then kick it up to high speed for the climb to the Lagrange point.”
Leharl nodded. “What do you think the chance of this profile successfully evading their detection is?”
Letha shrugged. “Perhaps as much as fifty percent, captain, more likely less. The sensor drone we are trying to use as a hole in this plan is only off by a very small amount, and for a very short time. For all we know, they might have a second band of passive sensors that we can’t even detect here. On the upside, if we fire from our current position, the thermal bloom from the launch will be hidden from their sensors. If they do detect the missile, it will probably be at one of two points, either as it passes the outer sensor net, or when it fires its engine to accelerate away from the planet. I would consider the missile as good as detected once its engine fires.”
“Bridge, CIC,” the speakers broke in, “the two outbound contacts have jumped to superlight and are clear of the system, their profiles are entirely consistent with a pair of heavy cargo-lifters on course to the Gamma Tau system.
“Thank you, CIC, good work on the track, glad to see you’re awake back there.” Leharl said the last with a chuckle; his Combat Information Center crew was rated among the best in the fleet.
“Good to know you care, Captain.” The CIC watch officer said with a chuckle of his own before signing off.
Leharl grinned and shrugged. “Well, if that’s the best chance on the board, we’ll take it. Helm, ahead dead slow, steer three-three-five mark zero, I want to be just behind the shadow of the asteroid, as close to the planet as possible. CIC, stand by on the electronic warfare suite, coordinate with Letha at science for timing and settings.” He turned to the other side of the bridge. “Fire control, make tubes seven and eight ready in all respects, including opening the outer doors, set the units in the tubes to follow the profile laid out by Letha. Make tubes one and two ready in all respects, including opening the outer doors, prepare for snapshots.” He grinned. “They are going to wet their semi-corporeal pants if this works. Sound general quarters!”
In all compartments flashing lights illuminated, and Leharl’s voice announced “General quarters, general quarters, all paws to battle posts!” Instantly the passageways were full of running Fela, heading to their assigned combat stations. Leharl usually did not sound general quarters until a combat situation was imminent, preferring to allow his crew as much rest and relaxation time as possible, so they all knew that something important was sure to follow.
Just under a minute later, Letha turned to Leharl and flashed a thumbs-up. “All stations report crewed and ready, Captain.” Almost as a counterpoint to her statement, Teal’c seemed to appear from nowhere, and hopped up to stand with his paws on Letha’s console.
“Well,” Leharl commented, “Looks like Teal’c is all ready to go too.” He grinned again. “Helm, take us in.”
With ponderous grace the Fel’s Wrath slowly edged toward a firing position near the equator of the asteroid, staying just barely within its shadow. The helmscat carefully manipulated his sidestick controllers, playing the maneuvering thrusters like a piano to get the ship as close as he possibly could to the target without revealing her to the sensors in the inner system. After a few minutes, he nodded to Leharl. “This is as close as we are going to get, Sir. I have an escape course already laid in, once we fire we can be out of this system and into superlight within five minutes.”
“Excellent work, Helm.” Leharl nodded approvingly. “FCO, are the weapons ready in all respects?”
“Aye, captain, the weapons in tubes one, two, seven and eight are ready for firing. The main battery is loaded and trained in to center, the secondary battery is loaded and trained out to standard covering arcs, the interceptor missiles are loaded and ready for targets, and the Kashtan units are in automatic intercept mode.”
“Very well, initiate firing point procedures, tubes seven and eight, target the refit station on preplanned course.”
The FCO tapped his panel, going through the procedure of clearing the missiles’ safeties and aligning them to their target bearings. “Firing point procedures established, Sir.”
“Match generated bearings and shoot, tubes seven and eight.”
The FCO rotated his tube selector to tube seven and flipped up the yellow-striped clear plastic guard on the ‘launch commit’ button, then reached his thumb into the recess and pressed firmly. The ship made the familiar shudder as the missile was ejected by the gas charge, and he rotated the selector to tube eight and repeated the procedure. The two missiles fanned out, making slight adjustments to their course to avoid any possible collision with the Wrath or the asteroid she was hiding behind, then turned on their inertial autopilots and began flying their preplanned course.
From her console, Letha observed the progress of the missiles, her display now reconfigured to show the sensor threat to the missiles. Since they were considerably smaller than the Fel’s Wrath, the size of the detection areas was very much smaller. As they approached the yellow bubble of ‘maybe detect,’ she saw the ‘ECM’ light on her console illuminate, and two of the bubbles near the missiles’ flight path vanished in a strobe of electronic static. For only a few moments there was a clear path, and down that path between the bubbles the missiles raced. It only took moments for the sensor drones to re-establish their coverage from the jamming spike, but by then only one missile remained on the edge of their detection range, and a moment later was completely clear.
Letha could almost feel the panic that had to be taking place aboard the refit station; they had to know that they were the only target in the system worthy of a surprise attack. Then again, she ruminated, they might not even realize that they were attacked; they might think we are playing electronic games with them. She shrugged, it was not her problem. “Captain, the missiles are through the outer drone field, no sign of detection so far.”
Undetected and unimpeded, the missiles drove toward the planet, skimming the atmosphere in a great loop, crossing the planet’s polar axis twice as they used the planet as a gravitational slingshot. When the missiles reached their apogee, their engines ignited. Suddenly they were approximately as stealthy as a comet, and every sensor in the system began screaming warnings. Letha had done her job well, the surprise was total.
Onboard the station, general quarters and emergency alarms sounded, with gunners and damage control racing to their posts as the docked ships’ crews franticly began their power-up procedures. Though well trained and highly motivated, all of the station crew’s determination could not alter time, and time was a commodity they simply had to little of. The station’s defenders directed a scattered and inaccurate fire against the inbounds, but it was almost a futile gesture, the missiles were just too fast.
Leharl smiled with the feeling of having private knowledge of exactly what was going to happen. “FCO, MIRV the weapons and set detonation standoffs.”
The crew on the station cheered as the missiles vanished in puffs of vapor, but their celebration was cut short when they realized that the twelve large pieces of the missiles were still incoming. The gunners had better luck in the last five seconds of the Sky Fire’s flight, tracking and destroying three warheads in as many seconds, but the remaining nine were more than enough. The station was backlit for an instant by a mighty soundless flash as all nine five-megaton warheads detonated simultaneously.
As the flash subsided, the station’s crew came to a startling realization. They were alive.
On the bridge of Fel’s Wrath, Leharl was already bending over the comm officer’s console. As soon as the FCO announced detonation, he pressed the transmit key on transmitters set to cover all bands that the Na-Drk were known to use. “Attention, Na-Drk forces, this is the FSF starship Fel’s Wrath. The missiles that just exploded around your station were a warning. Next time you break the Tenka treaty, we will not be so forgiving. Bear this in mind.” He signed off with an abrupt snap. “Helm, get us the hell out of here, I doubt they’ll take that well. Heading -three-seven mark zero-nine-zero, both ahead flank.”
“Aye captain, steering one-three-seven mark zero-nine-zero, flank speed.” The helm officer pulled both sidesticks over, rocking them forward and sliding them to their stops as Fel’s Wrath accelerated rapidly.
“Captain,” Letha said calmly, “we have three Na-Drk vessels on a pursuit course. They appear to be one destroyer and a pair of corvettes. We are outrunning the destroyer, but the corvettes are closing the range, now one-half AU and closing.” She shrugged. “Well, we knew at the outset that our chances of pulling this off without a firefight were not all that great.”
“You’re right, of course. CIC, Bridge.”
“CIC here, Captain,” the watch officer said a moment later.
“CIC, main radar to active, fake a launch signal and paint the two corvettes off our stern with the missile-guidance systems, try to get them to break off.” He turned to the FCO. “Lock the main battery onto them, train out as needed and prepare to fire. Helm, they can’t hurt us if they can’t catch us, so make their job a tough one. Maneuver at will.”
The helm officer nodded, “Aye, captain, initiating evasive maneuvers at maximum acceleration.” The starfield on the main screen spun sickeningly as Fel’s Wrath spun through a full revolution to point her main drives off axis, and applied full power, driving out of the planetary plane, hoping the confuse the enemy helms.
The FCO tracked the enemy vessels through the maneuver, the upper turrets stowing back to center as the lower turrets unmasked and continued the track. “Captain, the enemy vessels are not breaking off their pursuit, range is closing. Request permission to ready missiles for firing, and discharge a warning gun salvo.”
Leharl nodded at once. “Permission granted, make tubes two and three ready in all respects, open the outer doors. Set your shells to detonate close aboard, preferably with little damage, I would rather scare them off than kill them; they are not really all that hostile most of the time.”
“Aye, Captain, setting fuses.” The FCO touched his controls, sending range data to the shells inside the main turret gun tubes. “Fuses set for a ranged burst. How hard do you want me to rattle them, exactly, sir?”
Leharl grinned. “A good solid rattle, if you please, FCO. One on each side and one forward of them, let’s not make them think we missed by accident.”
Reply
"