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The Meeting - Part Nineteen
Random Vector
24.03.2268
Saltlake Naval Base
L5 Earth Orbit "Incoming
message. Coded. Priority One," announced the soothing electronic voice of
someone's idea of the perfect virtual secretary.
"Jesus.what
is it with this place?" Wexler grumbled as he flung back the covers and pulled
his robe about him. "Lights." He rubbed his eyes, squinting in the brightness.
"Receive and activate link.Wexler here." He saw the face of Captain Malvo,
commanding the Purdue and sighed heavily. "Captain, it is
3:40 in my a.m. This had better be very, very important."
"You
asked me to report any activity at Navy HQ, Vice Admiral. I've got a report of
the kind of activity we definitely don't want. The Malta just left with her escort."
Wexler
sat for a moment trying to absorb the news. "Damn! What else?"
"Nothing,
sir. Destination: classified. Mission: training
manoeuvres."
"Training,
my ass!"
"I was able to learn through
unofficial channels that they are probably headed for Epsilon Indi, sir, but
that's unconfirmed."
"Damn! What in the hell is she up to?" He started
pulling his clothes together as he thought. "OK, get the Purdue ready
for immediate departure, and recall all escort crews double quick. We're going
out on some training manoeuvres ourselves. Move. Wexler out."
______________________
"We're agreed then, Captain," said the tiny image of Hyslop-Smith
from the screen on the comm arm display. His voice still sounded haughty
despite the tiny sound that came from the audio next to the display unit. "This
is a significant setback, but the mission must proceed as planned."
"Yes," Ferris said. "Though with as much prudence as
we can exercise. I find the timing of this attack, and the fact that pirates
were paid to attack us more than a little disconcerting."
"To say the least," Hyslop-Smith agreed. "I haven't
seen such a bold strike by pirates or mercenaries at either of the Toliman
points for years. They're too well patrolled by the Navy for that.
"Where are all the Navy patrols now, Captain?" Ferris
asked rhetorically.
"I see your point," Hyslop-Smith conceded. "We've just
finished repairs. Let's get to the L5-Point, and jump to Tau Ceti before they
realize they didn't get us all."
"We're on our way. Redoubt, out," Ferris said
and reached to touch the control that would retract the armature. "Mac, we're
leaving for Tau Ceti. Set up our NAV waypoint, and get us there as."
Ravindran broke in excitedly with
new contacts appearing on the registry. "Captain, we have multiple signals
emerging from the L5-Point ahead. Two corvettes and two PatComs," Her tone
changed to one of relief. "It's OK, they're Navy vessels, sir. It looks like
we're getting some additional backup."
"That would be nice," added Ferris. "We sure could use
it."
"Rav, check your ORB display." McMichael said
cautiously. "Those ships are coming in awfully fast." It only took another
second for the situation to become clear. "Look sharp everyone, we've got
inbound missiles."
The bridge comms came to life, as the lead Navy vessel
hailed them. The four Navy vessels continued to accelerate as they approached.
"Ferris, this is Captain Peel of the Fairfax. Your traitor days are over. Not only are you a sell out, you're a
bloody coward. The punishment for treason is death. That's better than you
deserve, do you hear me? Our orders are to take you out, and I'm really going
to enjoy being the one to do it. At least you get the chance to fight. That's
more than you gave our friends at Tau Ceti. Goodbye, Ferris. All ships: attack
my target. Destroy the Redoubt at all costs!"
"What the.? Mac, get us some
distance. Now!" Ferris barked commands. They felt the roar of the main
thrusters immediately, and the corvette swung about and gained velocity. "Rav,
deal with those missiles for the moment. Skarsgaard, more power to thrusters
and the LDA for now, but stand by to shift power back to weapons systems." The PBCs
began firing, as Ravindran tried to pluck missiles from their destructive
paths.
Ferris keyed open his comms to Hyslop-Smith. "Crusader.
We're being attacked by those incoming Navy vessels! Evade and assist! Target
the corvette Fairfax."
"I already understood that much,
Captain. We're with you Redoubt." Said Hyslop-Smith. The wingman's reply
sounded remarkably calm to Ferris' shouts. "Launching missiles now."
The LDS drive activated as McMichael
did his best to evade the incoming missiles, but before they could traverse
more than a few hundred kilometres an LDS inhibitor missile burst nearby,
bringing everyone back to normal space for the duration of the exchange. The
main thrusters roared to life again, as they slewed and jinked to confuse their
attackers targeting systems.
"Captain," Skarsgaard yelled over the sounds of the
battle. "Why do they think we're traitors? Shouldn't we try to talk to them?"
He sounded genuinely upset.
"I get the feeling they're too busy trying to kill us
right now to listen to any arguments in our defence," Ferris shouted back, more
than a little upset by the situation, himself. "Just keep this ship in the
fight, Skarsgaard, and we'll figure out why they think we're traitors later. If
there is a later.'
Ravindran had been concentrating on her weapons fire
up to this point. She took a moment to report to the Captain. "There are still
two missiles tracking us. More will likely be on the way. The Crusader has
drawn the PatComs away, but she's taking heavy PBC fire from them. She isn't
firing back, so she may be damaged, or just reluctant to fire on Navy vessels.
The Fairfax looks to be disabled. She's immobile but she's still
launching missiles at us. The other corvette, the Almeida, is coming in
hot and fast. Firing."
They felt the jolt from the cannon machinery, as the
particle beam burst leaped from their starboard side toward the distant
attacker.
"Deflected." Ravindran said, a little disappointed.
She kept firing. Three incoming PBC bolts rocked the Redoubt as the Almeida
fired on them. They could see the brightly coloured flashes outside the
front view port as the LDA emitters countered and dissipated most of the energy
of the incoming PBC blasts. Suddenly, they could see the Navy corvette for a
split second as it hurled past them at seemingly impossible speed. "Aft
magazine, launching seeker. Firing again." She continued to report her
activity. It just didn't make sense that they were fighting for their lives
against Navy ships. They felt their ship rock from enemy fire. The Almeida was
trying the same rear-firing manoeuvre. From the energy impacts they felt, and
the sounds of alarms as systems took damage, it seemed to be working, too. Red
lights lit up Skarsgaard's board as the Redoubt felt the blows of the
attack. Skarsgaard dispatched repair teams to the more critical systems
immediately.
"Captain, we're taking damage.and
we've got more missiles coming at us from behind, now," Ravindran announced,
keeping her cool throughout. "Launching counter measures."
"Mac, keep us turning, and try to work back to the Crusader,"
Ferris ordered. He watched his display, as the Almeida's seekers closed
on them relentlessly. "Brace for aft missile impact!" he yelled. An explosion
rocked the ship, causing it to buck underneath them. Ferris was surprised at
how much worse he had expected it to be. It wasn't as big an explosion as he
expected. He looked at Ravindran, who was still focused on her display,
concentrating her fire between defensive bursts against incoming missiles, and
offensive shots.
"It detonated about three hundred meters aft of us,
sir," she said, as if reading his thoughts. "Counter measures fooled it. It
also looks like we hurt the Almeida on that last pass. She isn't
changing her vector or speed, and our seeker is about to."
A flash on her screen, and the changes in contact
registry information told the story. "Direct hit in her thrusters," she said
almost sorrowfully, as she called up new targeting information on their
remaining assailants. "We just killed the Commonwealth Navy corvette CNV 511
Almeida." There was a moment of silence as they all processed that
information, while the Redoubt sped toward the Crusader's
position. Even if it was done in self-defence, it went against everything they
stood for. "I guess that makes us truly rogue, now," Ravindran concluded. "I
wonder if the Indies will have us?"
"Do you think we should start a separate kills list
for when we take out our own guys?" McMichael quipped. "Y'know, for our stats
and stuff."
"Stow that talk, Mac! You too, Rav," Ferris shouted.
"We have more Navy ships to kill if we're going to save ourselves and our only
escort vessel. The Fairfax has started moving again, let's make sure she stays
out of the fight for good, and get ourselves out of here."
"Captain, the Crusader is back in the fight.
She just launched a REM missile at the two PatComs. They're turning and coming
back for another pass at her," McMichael described the scene before him,
enhanced by labels and vector trails on his HUD. "Unfortunately, the Fairfax is
still pouring missiles out at both of us."
"Not for much longer," Ravindran said. "Coming into
range of the Fairfax now. Switching to Rapid Fire Mode. Mac, keep us facing
the target. Firing." The PBC fired a rapid burst of punishing energy, building
up heat faster than it could dissipate it. McMichael spun the ship on its axis
to keep the Fairfax in the manual crosshairs as they sailed past it toward
the Crusader. Overheated, the weapons shut themselves down
automatically, leaving the Redoubt dangerously vulnerable for a moment,
as they shed heat. The tactic had worked, though. The last bolts tore through
the Fairfax's main forward fuel reserve section, and
the aft portion of the ComSec. A number of subsidiary explosions rumbled
throughout the hull of the vessel before it finally ruptured and billowed in a
violent fireball. The Redoubt, spinning back to face its trajectory, had
just destroyed its second Commonwealth Navy corvette in as many minutes.
They closed on the Crusader, which was crippled
but still in the fight. The REM missile she had launched detonated between the
remaining Navy PatComs while they were accelerating in for another attack run.
The rearmost PatCom was completely destroyed by the blast. The other PatCom,
the Plevna, was crippled by the blast, coasting on its previous course
directly toward the Crusader.
"Captain!" McMichael exclaimed. "The Crusader's
in serious trouble. Those missiles from the Fairfax are
heading straight for her and they're out of our range. We can't stop them in
time."
"Then let's hope the Crusader can," said
Ferris. They were closing the gap, but not fast enough. Helpless, they watched
the missiles close on the Crusader. Two seeker missiles slammed into the
Navy escort vessel one after the other, ending her service in an expanding
fireball. The explosion carried enough force to inflict more damage to the Plevna,
which coasted helplessly past the expanding fireball where the Crusader had
been. The bridge crew of the Redoubt were close enough now that they
could actually see the explosion envelope the crippled PatCom, deflecting it
off its course, and stripping off her magazine pylons and large chunks of hull plating.
"Well, if she wasn't screwed before, the Plevna sure
is screwed now," said McMichael as he watched the PatCom drift away from the
clouds of drifting debris that marked this battle.
Ferris nodded, as he keyed commands into his console.
"Let's leave them alone, and get the hell out of here. Mac, get us to the outer
boundaries of this system fast. Take us at least fifty a.u.'s out. Pick a
random vector, I don't care, just get us somewhere nice and quiet. Let's clear
this LDSi field and get out there before anyone else shows up." The thrusters
roared to life pushing the Redoubt further and further away from the
field.
"Captain, it may be too late to
leave here unnoticed," reported Ravindran. "A moment ago I detected a vessel on
the contacts registry. It was a civilian vessel, probably a tug or a freighter.
She was headed toward this L-Point and stopped when she detected the battle.
They probably saw the whole thing and decided to run for some other point."
"Damn! A witness was the last thing we needed. If
there was any doubt that we'd become traitors before, there won't be much now
that we've been seen destroying Navy ships. Did you get an ID on them?" he
asked.
"I'm afraid not," Ravindran said, matter-of-factly.
"They stayed quite far out, and I was distracted by the fighting, and what I
thought were more contacts."
"What do you mean 'more contacts'?" Ferris asked.
"For a moment, while I was going through sensor
filters on the contacts registry, looking for missiles or mines, I thought I
saw two new ships in the area. They were unknowns, corvettes from the looks of
it, and then they were gone. It was very similar to the sensor blips we picked
up at the time we engaged those pirates. They were probably sensor ghosts, or
echoes from all the debris we just made around here."
"Nothing we can do about it now," said Ferris, rubbing
his eyes with the heel of his hand. "Let's get out of here. I need a minute to
think." A chime indicated the LDSi field had been cleared, and the LDS drive
ramped up, kicked in, and hurled them away at near light speed.
"Captain, you realize that they'll have the L-points
of this system bottled up in no time, don't you? We may not have all that much
time," the new ENG Chief said.
"I'm fully aware of that Mr. Skarsgaard. I didn't say I
needed a lot of time, but I need to decide on a course of action and to do
that, I need to consult everyone. Assemble the bridge crew, and meet me in my
office as soon as we're at system edge and the backup crew are at their
stations. Make sure Colonel Carr and Lt. Dupuis are there, too."
______________________
24.03.2268
Alpha Centauri System
CNV 676 NIAGARA "Exiting Toliman point now," North said. "Welcome to
Alpha Centau.My God! There is debris all over the place!"
"Looks like there was a fight here recently," said Lejeunne.
"Very recently. Stay alert everyone. Any sign of the Redoubt?"
"None. I just got the last traces of a ship hitting
LDS as we were entering. No ID, and no way to pursue, just a rough direction,"
said Bates from her WEPs station.
"Iwamasa, what are you getting from
this debris? Any EDRs?"
"Aye, Captain," Iwamasa replied. "Mostly Navy vessels
here, plus a few neutrals from the navy's 'probably pirates' list. All of the
vessels assigned to escort the Redoubt were destroyed here. The other
wrecks were either formerly assigned to system defence, or the Purdue's
battle group. From the looks of it, though, I'd say the Redoubt got
away."
"What in the hell is going on?" Lejeunne asked no one
in particular.
Iwamasa chose to answer. "Whatever
it is, there is no way I'm going to believe that Captain Ferris is a traitor.
There was something funny about this whole mission, and the way I see it, this
is some kind of set up."
"I find this all difficult to believe myself. In fact,
I don't like it any more than you do, Kenji, but we received very direct orders
from the Vice Admiral himself. We are ordered to destroy the Redoubt." Lejeunne
said.
"I have to tell you right now, sir, if we come to that
point, you're going to have to place me under arrest. I cannot participate in
that kind of order. I don't care if it means the end of my career."
Lejeunne thought for a moment before answering. "I'm
afraid there isn't much we can do to stop this, Chief. If we find them and we don't
fire, our logs will show that we didn't carry out our orders."
Bates offered a solution. "I agree with Kenji. This
whole thing stinks. I mean, what ever happened to due process? We haven't seen
any evidence to support the claims that they've committed treason. Here's an
idea: What if we don't ever find them?"
"Are you suggesting we
intentionally avoid them?" asked Lejeunne.
"Let's assume that the Redoubt survived
whatever happened here," Bates went on. "Let's also assume that the trace we
saw hightailing it out of here was them. We could just head in the opposite
direction, go through the L4 point out that way, and start roaming the Epsilon Indi
system. I mean, if I were them, I'd head through Proxima to get back to Earth.
There ain't much out the Epsilon Indi way."
"I'm willing to be the one responsible for leading you
that way. I'll make something up to suggest I recommended going that way."
"Yeah," She nodded in agreement. "We could tell folks
that Kenji here told us 'they went that-a-way'".
Lejeunne considered the option, but didn't seem
convinced. "This is my first command, and I do not wish to blatantly disobey
orders. I certainly did not expect to be making such a choice so quickly. Those
orders were very clear and very explicit."
"But they tell us to kill one of
our own," Iwamasa continued. "Can't we at least request confirmation from
someone at Fleet Command? If nothing else it will buy them a little more time
while we await confirmation."
"Very well, I'll send the request for confirmation to
Fleet HQ. But when we get it, we will carry out those orders."
"Captain," Iwamasa said matter-of-factly. "I'm not
going to be a part of the destruction of the Redoubt. If you don't want
to avoid her, then we could always develop a serious drive or power plant
failure, the kind that would take a day or two to repair. I could knock us out
of the game right here and right now, if drifting around Alpha Centauri is the
preferred option."
"No, I've had enough of drifting, and this ship
needs to overcome her reputation for mechanical problems. We all owe Ferris and
the entire crew of the Redoubt a debt of gratitude. I'll send the
request for confirmation of the order and I'll agree to your suggestions. For
now." He spoke to North next. "Ensign, take us on a nice sightseeing tour of
the Epsilon Indi system. Let's all wish the Redoubt luck, wherever she
decides to go."
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