(INS Vindicator of Truth, Sedara System)
“Captain, they’re starting in on the planet.”
“I know.” Lieutenant Knox sighed as he watched the screen. Yadara and Binlaster had spent their lives as best they could, taking down three corvettes and a frigate before warping straight into a pair of cruisers, but they were still gone. His Vindicator was the only Imperial ship left in the system, and they were running silent, trying as best they could to emulate a hole in space.
All they could do was watch, as the Ihm Armada, which they’d tallied at six hundred and sixty ships, once you removed the ones that had already been destroyed, closed in on the planet of Sedara. It started with engaging the orbital defenses. The damn lizards must have been planning this for a while. They knew exactly where the weapons platforms were, even before they opened fire.
Sedara’s defenses did fire, of course, but they weren’t any match for an armada this size, and were quickly swept aside. According to the sensor logs, they barely did any damage worth speaking about before they were overwhelmed and destroyed. The defenses were primarily designed to deal with pirates, or small incursions, not an armada, after all.
“Look, sir. The orbital station!”
Knox shifted his view to the images coming in from the station in orbit, since the light of the Ihm’s attack hadn’t yet reached them out here in the outer system yet. Like most stations in the Empire, it was primarily used for transshipping, loading and unloading large freighters in the void, and using shuttles to get the cargo to and from the surface more easily. There were places for light freighters to land on the planet, of course, but anything that came in bulk was brought by one of the major companies, in their larger freighters, that would never be able to escape a gravity well if it landed on a planet.
The station was lightly armed, enough to warn off pirates, perhaps, but that was it. The Ihm warships made quick work of its weapons. However, it was clear that they were trying not to destroy the station itself. The shields were hammered down, and the weapons destroyed, but the station itself remained largely intact. Especially the habitation areas. And then a blast took out the communications array, leaving them in the dark.
That’s when it struck him. “Oh, Empress! They’re hoping to take captives.”
“A slave raid? Sir, even if that were true, there’s too many ships for a simple raid by slavers!”
Knox could understand his subordinate’s confusion. After all, most slave raids were ‘smash and grabs’, with at most a handful of ships, that would seek to load up as many slaves as they could before the Navy could respond in force. That was why Yadara and her sister ship had been stationed out here, after all. Two frigates were easily enough to fend off most slavers long enough for the Navy to send reinforcements.
“They aren’t trying for just a few slaves. They want all of them. The whole planet’s population!”
“But there are seven billion people on the planet!”
“And there are two hundred heavy troop ships in that armada alone. If they are built anything like the ones we use, and they don’t care about squeezing them tight, they can fit one hundred thousand people on each of them, easily. That’s twenty million, just with the ones we can see. If they have more transports coming…”
“I see, sir.”
“How long until Eighth Fleet can arrive in system?”
“Ten minutes at the earliest, if they’re keeping to flight regulations.”
“Keep track of everything. We might be limited to passive sensors if we don’t want to alert the Armada we’re here, but we can at least provide some intel for the Admiral when the fleet gets here. And record all transmissions from the station and planet. We’ll at least bear witness to whatever happens.”
“Captain, I’m getting some strange tachyon readings from the armada.”
“Tachyon readings? What’s going on?”
“Unclear, sir. Nonstandard regular emissions. Sounds almost like static. Not sure what is causing it, though. The light is still four hours behind.”
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“Record everything that you can. Any information at all will be vital, for when the—OH FUCK, the Fleet! Science, give me a best guess on what those tachyon readings would do to ships transitioning into the system! NOW, damn it!”
With sudden urgency, the science officer checked the numbers coming from sensors. “Unknown, Captain. I have never seen anything like this before. Best guess, however, would be that they’ve figured out some way to disrupt Transition drives, similar to how tarpits affect warp drives.”
Knox cursed. “Break cover, active sensors to full, emergency transmission to Eighth Fleet! Warn them not to transition! This is a trap!”
“Sir, Transition warning!”
Knox’s heart sank to the deck plate. “They must have redlined the engines, hurrying up once they heard that the Ihm had evaded the trap. We’re too late!”
(Flag Bridge, INS Traitor’s Bane, Seldara System)
The alarms were screaming the second that the Traitor’s Bane emerged from the endless moment that was a Transition. Admiral Landry cried out in pain, as she was thrown against a bulkhead, consoles exploding into sparks and flame all around her. The lights failed, and only half of the emergencies came on, the gaps in their red glow supplemented with the orange of fires that were beginning to burn.
Struggling to her feet, Landry felt her right arm hang dead by her side. She could see it was still attached, which was good, but she couldn’t feel it or move it, which was bad. Probably shock, covering for something worse. She must have hit her head, too, because there was blood running down her face, getting in her eyes.
Coughing against the smoke, she grabbed an ensign that wasn’t too injured, and helped him to his feet. Together, they managed to get everyone still breathing to the doors. By now, the smoke was getting thick, and the fire suppression systems were still not activating. Landry grit her teeth against the pain as she crouched by the door, and watched as two crewmen forced it open manually.
In the corridor, things were not much better, but at least they weren’t on fire. When the last living person was out of the flag bridge, she ordered the compartment sealed. The bodies could be recovered later, but the fire could not be allowed to spread to the rest of the ship.
Another explosion shook the deck plates, sending her stumbling into a wall, hitting it with her right shoulder. Pain exploded past the shock, and blackness took her. Just before her head hit the deck, the gravity died, and then shifted, hard.
(Main Bridge, INS Traitor’s Bane, Seldara System)
Captain Albert Hodges groaned as the ship threw him against the restraints in his command chair. He coughed once, shaking his head as he tried to clear the ringing in his ears. “Report! What hit us?”
A groan answered him from the sensor console. “I don’t know, Captain. One moment we were transitioning, and the next, wham! Never seen anything like it.”
“Flag bridge reporting fire and multiple casualties, sir!”
“Get a medical team down there, and check on the Admiral. Sensors, where are we? What is the status of the fleet?”
“Sensors put us almost ten light-hours away from our intended exit point. Captain! We’re entering the upper atmosphere of Seldara VII!”
“Emergency thrust! Helm, get us to a stable orbit, at least!”
“Aye, sir! Engines are struggling, sir, only getting 53% power.”
There was another explosion, and the artificial gravity failed, and, with it, the inertial compensators. “Get Engineering on the line, find out how bad we’ve been hit. Sensors, what is the status of the fleet?”
“I’m getting IFF signals from the fleet scattered across twenty billion kilometers, sir. Reports coming in… looks like one-two-seven out of one-six-five ships reporting. All ships reporting critical damage. Estimate the fleet at thirty percent combat readiness.”
“All ships throw tarpits if able.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Captain, emergency message from the Vindicator of Truth. Confirmed codes.”
“Put it through.”
“This is Captain Knox of the Vindicator of Truth to all Imperial vessels. The enemy has deployed some kind of Tachyon scrambling device! Do not use Transition drives!”
“Captain Knox, this is Captain Hodges, of the Traitor’s Bane. Report.”
“We were in stealth, on a ballistic approach to the planet so we could record as much information about the Ihm plans as we could when we detected tachyon emissions from the Ihm ships. We tried to get a warning out, but you transitioned just as they came on-line.”
“Damn, just our luck. What is your status, Vindicator?”
“We started our tarpit as soon as we saw enemy interest in our position. Enemy tarpits are in force, covering large areas of the inner system.”
Hodges nodded. “Transmit all sensor logs of the tachyon event to all ships in the fleet. The information that the Ihm have found a way to jam Transitions has to get out, no matter what.”
“Done, sir. Any further orders?”
“Escape and evade your pursuers, then join up with the fleet. Regroup at Sedara VII, behind the planet from Sedara Prime. We’ll figure out what to do then.”
“At once, Sir. Vindicator, out.”
Hodges coughed again, this time finding blood on his hand when he brought it away. He wiped it on his pants. He didn’t have time to be injured. “Pass the word to all ships, rendezvous at Seldara VII. Search and rescue crews may launch if able. Priority to the ships that are too damaged to move under their own power.”
(Fleet Command Cluster, IAS Perfection Made Manifest, orbiting Sedara)
“Warmaster, we have an Imperial transition event!”
Warmaster Rhiz Chokiyuss smiled as she turned her face from the readout of the lone Imperial ship that broke stealth the moment the Tachyon Shroud started. The little corvette was clearly a scout, left behind by the two brave, but unsuccessful, frigates that had tried to do anything in their power to damage her fleet.
That ship’s captain had obviously figured out what the Tachyon Shroud was meant to do, and had deliberately revealed himself in a bid to try and keep her prey from stepping into the trap. Unfortunately for the little ship, the Imperial ships were running early, spurred on, no doubt, by the tale of noble sacrifice the little ship had send on about the two dead ships.
She chuckled darkly. These primates were easy to understand, to her perfected mind. She knew that, when she bypassed their trap, they would realize that there was no hope, and do something stupid. And, because of that, the commander of the Imperial reinforcements would hurry to Transition in as quickly as possible. One need only read a sampling of the primate’s literature to know that was what they would do.
And so, she had made herself the bait. The Imperials, like a gethkad hunting beast, could not help but jump at the sight of her movement. Even if they knew it was a trap, they simply couldn’t help themselves, because they had not been Perfected, as she had been.
“And, what is their status?”
“Their ships are spread out across a wide range in the outer system, well inside the heliopause, Warmaster. Initial readings suggest that they acquired substantial damage. Unknown on the full effects.”
“And the scout?”
“Running towards the seventh planet, despite the squadron chasing it.”
“Very well, have the fourth wing pursue the scout and the wounded vessels. Have them watch out for suicide attacks like the earlier ships used. Destroy the enemy, if possible. If not, prevent their withdrawal from the system. The longer we can keep the Shroud secret, the fresher our forces will be when it comes to the true battles.”
“As you will, Warmaster.”
“Contact the priests. Once the station is secure, they may begin the ritual at their leasure.”