CHAPTER 37 - RESISTANCE
DATE POINT: MAY 11th, 7 A.U. (AFTER UNIFICATION)
LOCATION: SOL SYSTEM, ABOARD UTRN INDOMITABLE WILL
CAPTAIN HENRY O’TOOLE
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"Get me a full damage report! We need to increase the pressure on this bastard!" Henry shouted out as he reached for the FleetNet interface.
“On it, sir! Repair skiffs have been dispatched and a local damage control team is inbound! Port side drone launch systems are non-responsive. We retain full control of the starboard systems.”
WHAT JUST HAPPENED? I’M WITH THE MARINES COORDINATING EFFORTS TO REPEL POTENTIAL BOARDERS. WAS THAT A MUNITIONS IMPACT OR A BOARDING CRAFT? – CMDR ALVAREZ GOOD TIMING, GLAD YOU CHECKED IN. WE GOT HIT BY A PLASMA TORPEDO, KEEP UP WITH THE PREPARATIONS JUST IN CASE, BUT THIS SEEMS LIKE A RANGED BATTLE. NO SIGNS OF BOARDING CRAFT LAUNCHES YET. – CAPT. O’TOOLE
Fuck! I need to end this quickly. Henry thought as he ran through his tactical options.
"Fleetwide directive; launch the Dirge of the Fallen as an temporary screening frigate and change to Tetrad formation. Frigates: switch to missile storm tactics, two conventional one nuclear and one scrambler in the tubes, prep for two salvos, minimum gap timing. Be ready to launch in thirty seconds then slave the launch command to my control. Sword and shield squadrons, tie launch control into FleetNet also, we're gonna light this bastard up like the fourth of July!"
Henry saw each ship in turn send over fire control to his console as he smiled, programmed in a slight time delay, and then hit the command key to launch. Across the fleet, magazine control crews worked to load fresh anti-ship missiles into launch tubes to be ready for his inevitable second salvo. Twenty two massive precision anti-ship missiles raced towards the enemy, rapidly catching up to the smaller, slower, and dumber counterparts fired from the swarm of drones.
Explosions dotted the silent swarm of incoming missiles as the myriad laser point defense batteries dotting the wing like structures of Ur-Uatchti flashed with precision fire. In the last moments before the onslaught of missiles landed, the enemy dreadnought raised a titanic null barrier. Local space roiled and burned with exotic radiation and kinetic fire as the enemy ship’s barrier systems strained against the fury of the assault. Henry grimaced as several of his drones that had strayed too close were cooked with reflected radiation and dropped off his sensor net.
The storm of radioactivity was so intense, the Indomitable Will was effectively blind for a long, tense moment as the crew awaited the result of their attack.
“Did we get them?” one of the fire controlmen asked,
“You idiot, you jinxed it! You never ask that question!” Their helmsman fired back.
“Easy, people, we either got them or we didn’t. Sensors, What are we looking at? Get me a full LIDAR sweep while we're at it.” Henry called out.
“Resetting the system now, LIDAR scanning now.... Dammit! That's a negative kill. Visual spectrum coming back online.”
The bright flashes ceased, revealing a massive null barrier sailing through a rapidly dissipating plasma halo.
“Fleetwide directive; Pull back sword squadrons for R&R and send shield squadrons forward! We’re doing this again! No barrier system can withstand that level of heat buildup for long! We’ll crack their shell, or blow out their cooling systems this time, but either way they are ours!” Henry said, trying to avert the onset of fatalism and keep morale high.
The barrier dropped from around Ur-Uatchti revealing it to be effectively undamaged beyond a few superficial scars from his frigate’s main guns.
“Thermals show a huge heat buildup along the wings! Different spots than before, those might be their heat sinks… hang on, comparing thermal heat maps to before… Shit! Their plasma lines are hot! Prepare for incoming fire!”
Twin plasma beams lanced across open space once more, finding far fewer targets this time, yet still claiming far too many victims amongst his retreating drones. Immediately after, four plasma torpedoes arced out and traced a path towards the Indomitable Will and her defending frigates.
“Fleetwide directive; raise barriers and prepare for a missile barrage to counterattack when our barriers drop!” Henry called out.
Boldly, his frigates charged forward into the path of the plasma torpedoes before raising their barriers in time. Plasma washed over and dissipated around the barriers in a strangely beautiful display. As soon as their barriers dropped, Henry reviewed their status displays. Three of them blared warnings showing their heat sinks were redlining. The chances of them surviving a third assault were dwindling by the moment, meaning Henry had to end this fight now.
“Fleetwide directive; deploy trailing radiators and fall back behind the Indomitable Will. Make sure to leave enough space to shoot from around us! Your bravery has brought us to the brink of victory! Keep hammering the wings with your main guns and prepare another missile salvo.”
Henry prepared a slightly different firing solution with a smirk. Gonna get you this time, you bastard. He then hit the fire command, sending over a hundred missiles of all sizes to streak across the battlefield towards their enemy. Predictably, their enemy raised their barrier again, engulfing it once more in a smoldering blanket of explosions and nuclear fire.
“Sensors, I need to know the moment that barrier drops! Reset any washed out systems immediately!” Henry called out.
“Aye, sir!”
Henry plotted a course for the missiles he had cut the engines on before, which now silently streaked towards their enemy on momentum alone.
C’mon you bastard, drop that barrier. Henry thought as he ordered his surviving drones back to the ship and also brought up the flight controls on his other surprise.
“Barrier is down, Captain! Plasma lines are hot! They’re firing!”
Shit! Henry thought as he finished inputting his commands and switched to the FleetNet comms interface.
“Fleetwide directive; Frigates, retract radiators and turtle up! Stay behind our barrier, we’re tanking this round!” He then turned and shouted to his own crew, “Barriers up now!”
The enemy plasma torpedoes were rapidly approaching as the external camera feeds went dark, cutting off their signal to their drones and missiles. Henry hoped the commands he had submitted mere moments before would work. Henry gripped the railing as the barrier status registered a series of heavy impacts. The lights dimmed as power was redirected to feed the barrier system. The seconds ticked by painfully as the heat sinks that whisked the waste heat away from the barrier generators filled to almost half their capacity, all from tanking a single salvo.
“That’s good enough, drop the barrier!” Henry called out.
As the camera feeds reasserted themselves, a grin crept across Henry’s features. The missiles that had been silently gaining on their foe had impacted in a surprise attack just as he had hoped. The artfully crafted wings were scarred and torn, with whole sections slagged and melted away. Henry sent a fresh comms request to Horus, who accepted moments later. Horus was the very image of impotent fury with his bridge bathed in red emergency lighting and sparks flying behind him.
“Your ship is dead in the void, and you have lost. Surrender yourself into our custody and we will grant you and your crew mercy. I understand that there are great political fractures in your union. We wish to discuss these further and see if we have grounds for an alliance. I believe you may find we have more common ground and purpose between our parties than your might initially think.” Henry began before Horus spat blood out and snarled back into the camera.
“The Olympians hold Earth and the pathways to ascension, Ah’Mon Rah is missing, hidden away by the treachery of Set and Aten, and you have wrecked my ship and the one hope we had at restoring the balance! We see the truth of our circumstances would mean a gilded cage were we foolish enough to surrender. Your treachery and your lies hold no sway over us, we know you are a mere front for the Watchers, who move in the shadows and strike like cowards in the moment of our weakness. We would rather die a defiant heroes death than diminish the radiance of our glory through submission! This is far from over, Adamu!”
“Horus! Don’t be a stubborn fool about this! We can find common purpose and you can retain your honor! We want similar ends, and we seek allies! Listen to the voice of reason before your pride consumes you!”
“Still your silver tongue mortal, there is but one path ahead of us now. We shall burn your fleet with the rays of our purification when we free Rah from his imprisonment. This debate is over. Cut the feed!”
“Horus!” Henry shouted as the screen went black.
“New heat sources are building in the wings, they’re not dead in the water yet!”
“I didn’t want to do this…” Henry said to himself as he ordered the C.L.A.P.P.E.R round forward from its hiding spot behind Horus’ dreadnought. “But you leave me with no choice. Goodbye Horus.”
“Spacetime distortions building, gravity waves detected! What's going on?” Their sensor tech shouted.
“Captain, they’re running! You must cripple them now or we will lose them!” Dr. Silvar’Esh shouted.
Henry ordered the drone forward at full redline acceleration as he watched it converging on the trajectory of the fleeing ship. Ur-Uatchti wrapped itself in a barrier as Henry cursed and ordered the drone to disengage. A bright flash appeared in the pathway of the massive barrier, which rapidly expanded into a huge sphere with a shiny and distorted surface. The two spheres merged as the null barrier seemed to force its way into and expand the size of the distortion field until the two fully converged. As fast as it had expanded, it contracted down to microscopic size again and dissipated.
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“Radiation burst detected… identifying type…. Wait... that’s Hawking radiation!?”
Henry slammed his fist into his thigh in frustration. “Motherfucker!”
“That was a wormhole, the other end could be anywhere within Sol, or even in a friendly allied system where they could get access to repairs. I can generate a list of possibilities for you if you wish. There are only a handful of friendly systems left on this side of the invasion line. We know they wouldn’t dare run to a system controlled by Apophis.” The doctor said from behind Henry.
“I should have just hit them with the C.L.A.P.P.E.R when I had the chance…” Henry griped, allowing himself one brief moment to feel sorry for himself before steeling his mind.
“If they were still within Sol, knowing what intel we did manage to glean about there being a three way rift politically, where might they find safe harbor? Is there a dry dock that Horus might still control that the Alderei are aware of?”
“Horus let slip that Set and Aten teamed up together to betray Rah. The other Ur-Uatchti dreadnought is therefore most likely under Aten and Set’s command. We tracked that other ship to an asteroid base in the inner asteroid belt some time ago, but we only have a general idea of its location. The only other active bases we know about in the system are orbiting Jupiter and Venus. Jupiter is within our detection range, we would have seen the wormhole end point hawking radiation burst if that was the case. Venus is inside the line of control of Set and Aten, so that is highly unlikely they would run there. There is also the matter of the missing colony ship Nii’Baruu. If I had to place a bet as to a possible dry dock location that Horus still controlled, it would be aboard Nii’Baruu.”
“I thought we didn’t know the full capabilities or location of Nii’Baruu.” Henry replied, rubbing his temples as he fought off a growing headache.
“We don’t know where it is, but we do have an unproven suspicion that it houses the primary shipyard in system. Nii’Baruu is remarkably similar in form and design to the Ur-Uatchti class, but it has a five hundred kilometer wingspan instead of a mere five like the smaller class of ship. We suspect such a massive colony ship to contain everything needed to manufacture advanced components even up to the construction of new ships. That is just still little more than well grounded conjecture until we can get some form of verification. We certainly have little other evidence of advanced manufacturing capability elsewhere in the system.” Dr Silvar’Esh replied.
“Right, evidence by absence. Not much to go on, but I can see the reasoning behind it. Are you certain that Horus is unable to control this Nii’Baruu? I think it goes without saying that we cannot fight such a monster on our own.” Henry replied, fighting a horrible sinking gut feeling.
“It is likely that he has come level of control over certain subsystems, but the available evidence is pretty clear that only Rah can assume full command of the ship. If Horus could command it, then we believe it is likely he would have used its power to retake the inner system from Set, Aten, and the Olympians. If not that, at least he would have used it to force a treaty that restored him to power.”
“Dammit. You know... at this point I am not sure if that’s good or bad news. If we do wind up teaming up with Horus, he would demand our help in freeing Rah which gives them back Nii’Baruu. Maybe it really is better that Horus refused to listen... at least he is neutralized as a rogue element for the near term. His Ur-Uatchti is a wreck after this last battle. Even under ideal circumstances, it will take a long time to repair that damage.” Henry replied before he turned to look over his bedraggled CIC crew.
“I’d better address the fleet.” Henry said. “I need that damage control report, stat!” He called out.
“Working on it, Captain. The repair skiffs and fireman teams are on site and working on assessing the damage now. I’ll follow up with them and get you a preliminary report right away.” His comms officer replied.
“Thank you.” Henry said as he reached for the FleetNet interface.
“Fleetwide directive; I want to thank every one of you for your bravery and your quick and efficient actions in this battle. We may not have killed our opponent, nor convinced them to stand down and parley, but we crippled their ability to threaten us in the near term. Horus, the captain of that ship was on our list of possible ideological allies, and his mistrust seemed to stem from catching us with the Alderei near Saturn. It is not known the ultimate ramifications of this turn of events, but the fact remains that we have survived this battle mostly intact and are capable of continuing our mission. For the time being we can relax, write up our AAR’s, and rotate crews to give those heroic souls who fought so bravely some well-earned rest. Go with my thanks and my respect, you have certainly earned it today.”
Henry then opened a direct comm to drone control.
“Drone control, this is your captain speaking, do you read me?”
“Captain, reading you loud and clear. What can we do for you, sir?”
“I need you to resume combat space patrols immediately, then focus the rest of your active pilots on drone recovery. I want to bring back everything that looks even remotely salvageable. Once we have completed recovery operations, I want to get a full operational headcount of our remaining drone and missile stockpiles. You all took a nasty hit it seems, how is everyone? Did we take any casualties?” Henry asked.
“Sir, thank you for asking. We have some minor injuries being transported to the hospital wing, no fatalities. I will have your report ready for you ASAP, don’t worry. As far as the damage is concerned, we are still finalizing our assessment, but its looking grim. Our port side launch system took an indirect hit which allowed the double hull to diffuse the worst of the damage. The location that we took the hit was one of the worst spots though, we had plasma infiltration down through the launch bay and into tertiary drone storage. The whole system might be slagged along with as many as ten to fifteen percent of our stored drones. Luckily the missile magazines are placed deep behind thick armor. If that had taken the hit, we may have lost everything. From the initial images I have seen, the damage might not be field repairable, sir.”
Henry gripped the railing tightly in frustration as he processed the news,
“Well, shit. That certainly is mixed news. I’m glad we had no fatalities, and even more so that it was a glancing blow. I don’t like the idea of permanently losing half our launch capacity. Keep me posted and get me a list of parts that we would need. Maybe the Hephaestus can machine up some of the ones we don’t have spares for.”
“I certainly agree with you, and I’m also glad we avoided the bigger disasters, but you might want to come up and see the damage for yourself, The whole system is slagged fairly deep into the superstructure. It’s bad, sir, a typed report may not do it justice. When do you think you could make it up here for an inspection?”
Henry ran his fingers through his crimson hair, touching the throbbing scab forming where he hit his head earlier causing him to wince.
“I’ll make it a point to come up there as soon as I can break away form the CIC. When do you think you can get us that damage control report?”
“We have our best people on it now, you’ll have it soon. Was there anything else, captain?”
“No, carry on. I’ll be up for an inspection soon as it is feasible for me to do so. Other than that, pass the message along to everyone that you all did us proud today.”
“Thank you, sir, I will.”
“Excellent, I have to check on some other action items before I come by for my inspection. Carry on.” Henry said as he cut the call.
He tried to stuff the horrible sinking feeling he had down as his mind processed the implications and he did the math on the drones he had seen get destroyed along with those in the port side tertiary storage.
Losses could exceed a quarter of our available drones in a single engagement, and possible permanent destruction of our port side launch rails… all because we botched the barrier timing.
It really hit home how badly this engagement could have gone, hell, how badly it had gone, in a way he didn’t have the time to process in the heat of battle.
No, I can’t do that. We survived and we won. We are still plenty combat capable; we just have to play our hand smarter the next time. I’d better check our anti-ship missile stockpiles too while I’m at it….
Refusing to let the walls close in, Henry refocused himself yet again and began to organize a concrete list of actions he would need to take in the coming hours. He then reached for the comms interface again, ready to ring magazine control before he hesitated and moved his finger over the icon for C.L.A.P.P.E.R control.
We only got off two salvos, I can do the math. Henry thought as he pressed the call button.
“C.L.A.P.P.E.R control do you read me?”
“Henry! I didn’t think we would rate a call so early, not that I’m complaining. How are things down there? Is everyone alright?” Chantal said, bringing a smile to his face.
“We’re good, I wanted to check in with you and hear your voice, make sure you were okay. You all aren’t too far away from the impact zone. I’ve gotta imagine that rattled your cage a bit when we took that plasma torpedo. How is everything down there?” Henry asked.
“That’s sweet, I was worrying about you too, but I know you have a lot of other people to worry about not just us. I managed to get the drone reassembled and back in her cradle before the battle really kicked off. Thankfully I had barely started working on the calibrations, so it was easy to get her back together. We were all in our acceleration couches by then, so nobody was hurt.”
“Good, that’s a relief. Listen, the port side drone bay got hit and I’m about to head up to personally inspect the damage while drone control organizes a battlefield cleanup and salvage recovery op. Think you can peel away to come and join me? I know you’re busy, but I value your input and I’d like to have you by my side for this.” Henry said
“Yeah! Of course, I’ll put Pierre in charge, and I’ll head right down. You know you can have me any time you need me, sweetie.” Chantal said with a smile.
“I know, I’m glad I can count on you.” Henry replied.
“You will always have my support, my love. Give me five minutes and I‘ll be there. Love you!” She replied gleefully and then cut the feed.
“Love you too.” Henry said with a smile.
Henry then sent a text through his neural implant interface to Alvarez.
ALVAREZ, I NEED YOU TO MAN THE CIC. I’M GOING TO HEAD UP TO DRONE CONTROL TO INSPECT THE DAMAGE INFLICTED FROM THAT PLASMA TORPEDO - CAPT. O’TOOLE ON MY WAY AS SOON AS I WRAP UP HERE, ALMOST DONE - CMDR ALVAREZ
While he waited, Henry busied himself reading the incoming reports from his assorted section chiefs regarding the status of their assorted commands.
“Henry.” A warm voice and a hand on his lower back snapped him out of it. He turned and saw his girlfriend smiling at him. Henry got up from his console and they hugged tightly as he felt some of the stress he had been carrying melt away.
“I’m so glad you’re okay and that we survived that. Combat is horrible! I don’t know how you do it. When your voice came through the speakers though, I must say it really helped calm our nerves. I’m sure it helped have the same calming effect for the rest of the fleet.” Chantal said as she stroked her hand slowly across Henry’s chest.
“I’ve been training for this moment in command of warships for years now. This was my first real battle where I was in full command of the whole operational theater myself. I’m glad I came across calmer than I felt, especially after we missed the barrier timing and we took that hit. I just... I guess because I had so many people counting on me, I slipped into this zone where I could put my own feelings off to the side so I could think and act clearly.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Henry saw Alvarez stride through the doorway into the CIC. Chantal pulled away from Henry and straightened her BDU’s with a sheepish smile.
“Don’t mind me, you two. Reporting to the CIC for duty, as requested!” Alvarez said with a salute and the slightest hint of a smile which Henry returned.
“Thank you, the CIC is yours for now. Things are pretty quiet though we are still waiting for the last AAR’s to come in, the battlefield salvage op to be finished, and the detailed damage report to come through.”
“Yeah, I felt it when we got hit. I'm glad it wasn’t boarding craft, but honestly I’m not sure that this wasn’t ultimately worse. I hear the drone bay took the hit. How bad is the damage?” Alvarez asked.
“Yeah, the port side drone bay got hit right around the launch rails, it took those out along with tertiary storage. That’s what we are heading out to inspect now. I’ll keep you posted with the full update once I have a better handle on it myself.” Henry replied, running his hand through the back of his hair.
“Nasty bit of business, that. I’ll hold down the fort from here. Hopefully we have the ability to repair whatever damage was done.”
Henry just nodded and with a sigh, took Chantal by the hand and headed towards the quick lift. Henry couldn’t help but shake the feeling that it wouldn’t be that easy as he struggled to prevent his mind from running wild with worst case scenarios.