The fox condemns the trap, not himself.
- An ancient saying attributed to one William Blake
The harsh light of the distant sun reflected off the metal hull of the IMS Orion as it drifted through the empty void of space. Or nearly empty void, a dozen ships arranged in formation alongside the Orion, ranging from nimble corvettes to hulking destroyers bristling with armaments.
It was a small fleet of warships that hung in the endless night, waiting. If this had been in the old days when fleets fought upon the the oceans of planets there would have been sound. The creaking of ships of the line as they rose and fell with the waves, the shouts of brave sailors going about their business, and the howl of the wind as it tore across the open sea.
But here there was silence; the warships were armored bastions of metal instead of wood, almost tomblike in appearance, for their crews were contained within, where their murmured conversations could not escape. And even if the noise could escape, there was no air in the vastness of space to carry their shouts.
This was not the times of ages past, where the thunder of guns roared across the waves, balls of lead flying through the air before smashing wooden planks into splinters. This was the modern age, where monuments of steel launch tungsten darts at incomprehensible speeds, where beams of condensed plasma melted through hulls in seconds, cooking all within. This was the modern age, where a hull breach meant death, here was no ocean of water waiting to fill the breaches in the hull. Instead the air would rush out, out into the emptiness of space where it could not be reclaimed. This was the modern age, where a single mistake could doom a crew of thousands.
And all this would happen without a single decibel of noise. The void of space would swallow the scream a railgun munitions as they tore across the sky. The hiss of melting steel would fail to reach deaf ears. And the screams of those sucked out of their ships could only be heard by themselves.
There was only one sound that resounded within all the ships of the Orion’s fleet. The blip of a radar going off, signaling the end of the wait.
At first only one form appeared at the edge of thermal scanning range and the semi-constant blip… blip… blip was solitary. But more shapes emerged from from the darkness, bringing more noise with them.
An order was given out from the Orion and the fleet came to life.
Sound blasted throughout the command ships silent hallways: thrusters roaring as flame and heat were ejected, propelling the slumbering giant forward; the electric whine of grav-thrusters turning the Orion, angling it towards the distant shapes on the radar; and below it all the low rumble of weapon systems coming online.
The fleet began to move, at first slowly, yet as the minutes wore by the warships accelerated to dizzying speeds. The gap of hundreds of kilometers between the two forces quickly closed to dozens and the commander of the Orion took stock of their opponent’s forces.
There were five of them, four destroyers and one cruiser, flying in a close wedge, their forms almost blurring together into a wedge shape on the hologram from the expelled heat of their thrusters. An altogether odd formation, it was dangerous for ships to fly that closely together at any speed, but it did make it difficult to get an idea on the complement of ships within the fleet, at least from this range.
A decision was made and the Orion’s fleet was split into three formations, each a complement of 4. One destroyer to punch holes in the enemies armour and three corvettes to assist and protect their slower cousins. The center formation also contained the sole cruiser class warship in the Orion, larger and stronger than even the destroyers, it would be able to assist either wing with its immense firepower.
It was a simple strategy, but tried and true. Trap your opponent in a crossfire and fill them with holes from every direction. The enemy would not be able to attack any one formation without turning its back on the other two. Yet the commander of the Orion was still wary, their opponent was known to for pulling tricks out of seemingly nowhere.
Yet as the two fleets closed together the opposing fleet did not break its odd formation, nor did it deviate from its course. The commander frowned in confusion, did she not see that the trap she was flying her fleet into?
And then the answer appeared, on the floating hologram the thermal scanners began to pick up more information. The two-dimensional arrows gradually sharpened and filled out into the holographic forms of warships, glowing jets of superheated ions merging behind in a long tail. Glowing points began to appear on the opposing ships, spots where the ships were warmer, indicating heavy weapons batteries. And judging from the small constellation of hot spots on each ship, they were packing a lot, far more than the Orion’s fleet.
Evidently the opposing commander was planning on attempting to overwhelm the Orion’s formations with massed firepower one at a time. The idea had some merit, each formation was weaker than the whole of the opposing fleet and could be overwhelmed if in short time. But in the meantime the enemy would be getting hammered from all sides, it would be impossible to angle defense systems to block everything. Especially since they couldn’t be armed with that much of it, not with most of the power needing to be routed to the heavy weapons.
The commander of the Orion felt a grin forming across his face as a new plan came into being. The lack of defense systems and point-defence gave the enemy a glaring weakness to fighters capable of getting close, they would be able to wreak havoc and destroy the heavy weapons before they could overwhelm one of the Orion’s wings.
Normally the fighters would be reserve, ready to drive off opposing squadrons or dive in if an opportunity presented itself. But now there was no need, the enemy fleet didn’t have any corvettes to drive off the nimble fighters and definitely lacked the fighters to drive off the Orion’s.
The new plan was drafted just in time for the first shots to be fired. As the fleets closed the distance to within a sixty kilometers and slowed to combat speeds. The brighter dots indicating the heavy weapon systems abruptly grew in intensity before expending great blooms of heat as they fired.
The commander watched calmly the glowing projectiles silently tear across the empty space between fleets. A second later dotted lines shimmered into view as the computers traced likely flight paths and targets for each projectile. Most were aimed directly towards the left wing and he smiled. His analysis had been correct, they were aiming to overwhelm one wing before turning on the others.
He ordered his own fleet to fire in turn. New trajectories flared into existence, ropes of light tying the two fleets together. The railgun rounds would hit second, lasers having struck or missed the moment they were fired. Torpedoes were following close behind, not nearly as fast, but able to curve in space to strike precisely.
Interception fire launched from the left wing, counter missiles and coilguns firing to destroy projectiles before they hit. The two masses of discharged weaponry sped towards each other on the hologram, looking like two stormfronts of glowing particles about to collide; yet it would still be almost half a minute until even the swiftest of them could collide.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
The commander of the Orion felt sweat drip down his back as he waited for the various projectiles to collide. He tried to shake out his tensed muscles, but it did not help much. This was his chance to win.
Too soon— not soon enough, he could not decide. It did not matter, time was up.
Lasers flashed through space, sizzling against armour, melting and weakening the metal for impacts or disabling weapon batteries and communication towers. Darts fired by railguns over Mach 3 punched through adamantium plated hulls like they were paper, barely even slowing as they cut through entire vessels. Torpedoes tore vast rents open, exposing the bowels of ships to more fire.
This is not to say everything hit, or even most of it. Warships launched countermeasures throwing off targeting systems. Adamantium was tough, not enough so to stop a direct shot of a railgun, but if the angle was off the darts glanced off with a shower of sparks before spinning off into the void. Counter missiles and point defence systems destroyed darts and detonated warheads early.
The commander of the Orion watched all of this happen in silence, displayed as nothing more than a chaotic series of flares of light within the hologram. The only sounds heard within the Orion’s bridge was the distant thunder of weapons launching and the tinny blip of the scanner.
Just as suddenly as it had started, the first volley was over. It seemed the enemy preferred massed strikes for this battle, more attacks would get through the defenses, but they had to wait for the slower loading weapons to fire. Orion’s commander had already decided to cycle his weapons as fast as they could fire, it would be easier to whittle them down with their lackluster defenses.
Although less of his own attacks had made it through then expected. The commander cast his eyes over the thermal scans of the enemy fleet, searching for point defense emplacements he had missed before and finding none. There were some fighters flying about, characterized by tiny triangles of light in the hologram; perhaps they had been on interception missions?
The commander shrugged and turned his attention to his own damage reports— and winced. The enemy had targeted his lesser armoured corvettes and it was not a pretty sight. One had turned orange on the hologram, indicating moderate damage, while all the others were a lighter shade of yellow.
But this was not bad, the enemy had taken some damage too, it was difficult to miss as they were so clumped up; another flaw in their plan. And they were still falling into the trap, the Orion’s fleet ready to envelope its opponent’s in a deadly hailstorm as the enemy curved into the left wing.
The order was given and the fighters launched. Dozens of them streamed from the flight bays of the ships, forming into squadrons and arcing towards the enemy fleet from three directions.
As the larger warships began to fire in constant drum of heavy weapons the fighters closed the swiftly shrinking gap. A hundred and seventeen in all. Enough to overwhelm the enemies lackluster defenses and destroy their weapons systems.
I snorted at the move. Idiot.
It was expected the enemy would launch its own fighters in an attempt to blunt the attack, but none came and it was only then that the commander felt the faintest inklings of the possibility this might be a trap in turn.
As the fighters closed the distance to within a dozen kilometers the clumsy formation of his opponent finally broke.
Blip-Blip-Blip-Blip-Blip-Blip-Blip-Blip-Blip-Blip-Blip
A sounds of the ships pinging off the radar sweep practically muddled together and it took the commander a moment to realize what had happened.
The enemy had multiplied.
Four new ships appeared on the radar. They had been hidden in the center of the formation somehow. They were smaller than the destroyers that had formed the wedge, corvettes, and the commander felt a sinking feeling he knew how they were fitted.
Smaller flares of light burned across the screen, point-defense and smaller weapon systems fired upon the rapidly closing fighters. It was too late to recall them, turning around would only slow them down, turning them into easy targets for enemy corvettes.
The first barrage took out thirty fighters, primarily from the left wing’s already thinner squadrons. The four corvettes were armed entirely with all manner of anti-fighter weaponry. A ridiculous loadout for any ship who braved the void, yet in this instant, perfect for destroying the commander's hopes of victory.
It was only now that the Orion’s fighters had been thinned out that the enemy launched theirs. Between the corvettes and fresh enemy squadrons, the Orion’s complement of fighters was reduced to scrap within minutes.
And it was only now that he realized why the enemy had been targeting the corvettes over the destroyers. As the focused fire of the enemy fleet tore his left wing apart, bombers escorted by fighter squadrons closed in and easily disabled the now stranded destroyer, while the main fleet turned its attention to the center and the Orion.
He could only watch in shock and horror as the fleet arced around and repeated the maneuver. She’d done it again, played him like a bloody fiddle. Again!
He numbly stood there watching his remaining ships explode in brilliant flashes of light. But no sound came from them, for this was the modern age, and war was fought in space, where its terrible thunder and the screams of its victims could find no human ears to listen.
As the IMS Orion’s munitions stockpile blew and took the bridge with it blazing red letters stretched across the sim-room.
DEFEAT!
* * *
A small cheer greeted me as I sauntered out the sim-room and I grinned and raised my arms in victory. A crowd of cadets was gathered in the common room where they had been watching the simulated combat I had just dominated. Again.
I laughed and made my way over to Emily’s table, accepting the high fives and congratulations from my peers. The brunette raised an eyebrow as I dropped into the seat across from her.
“Another rousing victory for the great admiral Fox”
I gave my friend a grin and ignored the sarcasm dripping from her words.
“I wouldn’t call it “rousing”— dumbass split his fleet in three. Would have smashed him even if he hadn’t thrown away all his fighters.”
Emily frowned at that.
“Wasn’t that a Tri-Pincer formation? That’s like the most tried and true tactic in the entire navy.”
I shook my head at her ignorance.
“You need more ships for Tri-Pincer to work, needs at least a full battlegroup for each wing, anything less will be overwhelmed if the ene—“
My ramble paused as Emily glanced up at something over my shoulder and let out a low whistle.
“Acaba looks pissed!”
I blinked in confusion.
“Who?”
“The poor sod you just trounced for the third time in an hour.”
At that I grimaced, already knowing what was coming. I half-turned in my seat as the dark haired cadet practically stormed over to our table. I schooled my expression into one of pleasant neutrality, having long ago learned the risks of appearing too smug in a victory. Apparently I wasn’t very successful, as Acaba scowled upon reaching us.
“H-how did you do that? Where did those ships come from?” He said angrily to me. It took me a moment to realize he was talking about the corvettes I had concealed behind the heavier warships.
“Oh! Yeah, uh- the heat wake from the destroyers and cruiser can cover the signature of the corvette-“ Acaba cut me off.
“What! That doesn’t make any sense! They should have appeared on the scanners!”
Acaba was working himself up and now I was getting annoyed at his tone. It was pretty obvious where this was going, he was going to accuse me of somehow cheating the rules of the simulation or something ridiculous along those lines.
“It’s called the heat wake dude, keep your ships close enough together and their thermal signatures merge. If you’d looked at any sensor other than thermals you might have noticed the trick early.”
“Aly,” Emily said warningly as the other cadet flushed with embarrassment.
I knew I was making it worse by lecturing the other cadet, but I hated sore losers. Why couldn’t people just accept getting outsmarted by a girl half their size?
“But that would damage your ships!” Acaba said, jabbing a finger in my face. “The heat would melt your corvettes that close!”
I leaned out of the way of the offending digit and raised my hands in surrender.
“Yes, and it did! I dunno know what you want from me man! First you say no Skills, then no magic, and now your complaining when your still outclassed with no excuse to hide behind.” I said matter of factly.
“Aly…” Emily moaned behind me.
My eyes raced across my furious peer’s face as my words registered, analyzing his response. Flushed skin, vein bulging on his forehead, heavy breathing. All basic indicators of anger, nothing too extreme by itself. But when factoring in the two weeks spent cooped up in here and the clenched fist at his side— Oh snap.
But before I can face the consequences of my runaway mouth the intercom blares to life around us.
*Attention! Cadets of Her Imperial Majesty’s Navy report to flight deck for transfer shuttles. Prepare for void shift in ten!*
We froze. I stared at Acaba. He stared back. Our argument forgotten as cadets scrambled to the doors around us. I felt excitement welling up inside my chest. We had arrived, it was time to graduate into full fledged officers in the Imperial Navy.