End of Worlds
Chapter 5
Medical Center
TCS Absolution
Granita System
Of all the bays and rooms inside Abby, the medical wards were by far the nicest. The most modern. At least that was the way Zollern viewed them. It was a far cry from the corridors leading to it, with its flickering light, and missing ceiling panel. That panel was likely borrowed to patch up something else in the elderly battleship. It would not be the first time, and assuming they lived to see another day, would not be the last. Consoles inside the center were all fully functional and back-lit. The walls were as smooth as a ship just launched. Some places he could even see a partial reflection.
As with missing panels outside, his own visit was not his first, and probably not his last. The lull before the storm finally broke, and not even a successful raid against a nest of traitors could save the levee. The Chief of Security muttered curses beneath his breath for the tenth time this morning. Another crewmember decided upon a premature retirement, this time one of the gunnery crew. With the task force still well behind enemy lines, Abby needed every able bodied man tending her weapons.
Zollern took some solace in knowing he was not the only person who did not want him to be here. Lieutenant Commander Mirat only just finished tapping in her report on a piece of smart paper, a plastic device thin enough one could almost see through it. “Another senseless death,” she muttered, whether to herself of to Zollern, was unclear.
Zollern nodded. “Indeed.” He knew a very few sensible deaths. Without war raging all around, death would just be a part of life. For the past thirty-five years, it has dominated life. Senseless deaths were one of the few subjects the two could agree upon.
“I assume you want a report zapped to your desk?” Mirat asked. Her eyes pierced him like cold knives, though not the frigid cometary stare she usually gave the Marine. Aside from anger, be it at him personally or the state of the Confederation in general, Zollern saw much exhaustion in those eyes. He could think of not a soul onboard the Absolution who was not closed to being burned out– except maybe the resident Cats.
“Cause of death?” Zollern asked, his tone all business. He already knew the answer, discovered in the course of his investigation. This death had enough witnesses.
Mirat frowned, knowing he already knew the answer. She too went through the motions. “A clean death, for the most part. Grabbed a live power cable in his battery, completely failure of neurological activity within seconds.”
Since his fellow gunners watched him lunge at the wire, there was no doubt in Zollern’s mind this was no accident. There was also no room for doubt that the Captain would be displeased upon receiving the official report. “Another report to send Powers.”
“He won’t be happy,” Mirat stated the obvious. Anybody who served under Maxwell Powers knew he was never happy.
“I’ve never known him to be,” Zollern responded, following up his own though.
Mirat pursed her lips, dissatisfied. “Captain Powers has been through a lot this past year. The losses might be a little too much for you to comprehend. Sir.” She added the honorific a step too slow after scalding him.
Zollern’s eyes narrowed to a glare, burning away at the medical officer. “I’m sure Ellie would disagree with you.” He said, his voice as cold as her frequent stares.
The name did not register for a moment, and when it did, her cheeks reddened and Mirat turned her gaze away. “My apologies, Colonel. I’ve spoken before thinking.” All of Abby’s higher ranking crew read Zollern’s file when he transferred onboard, and all knew about his wife. By her tone, Mirat sounded genuinely sorry for her words.
Zollern made a quick wave of his hand, dismissing the issue. “It don’t mean nothing,” he gave the typical T.C.M.C. response to the loss of a close friend and comrade to the Cats. If Repleetah did anything for Zollern, it put him on a first-name basis with Death. For a wonder, Mirat made no snappy comeback to the Marine Corp’s callous attitude regarding the inevitable.
Zollern quickly changed the subject. He can think of many topics he would rather discuss than the loss of the only woman he considered worth marrying. It was only fortune that she ventured to Sirius Prime to visit relatives, and did not take their daughter along. Zollern glared over at one of the active consoles. “Any news on the mainframe we liberated?”
Mirat raised an eyebrow at his ironic choice of words. “Liberated,” she muttered with a smirk. She then shook her head. “No, Colonel. If I understand the techs correctly, there is not a single bit of information on the Life-Eater Virus.” It was a bulky name for a disease, even an engineered one, in Mirat’s opinion. However, she could not control how it was translated from Kilrathi.
Zollern scowled, suddenly wanting to hit that same console he looked upon. “So it was all for nothing,” he grumbled. Perhaps nothing was an exaggeration; they did wipe out that nest of traitors. Not much of a return on the investment, and no doubt at least one of them sent out word to their overlords.
Mirat did not argue. “As far as I, or any of the medical staff can determine, the Mandarins were vaccinated or isolated. It would have helped if you could have brought back some of them alive. Dead even; we could learn a bit from an autopsy.”
Zollern sighed. There was one thing he learned about this war that raged across generations: “I’m sure we’ll have another chance to see this virus.” One way or another.
Mirat frowned as she studied the Marine. She thought the same as he; they would see it again when the Kilrathi bomb another world with it. “Will it ever end?” she asked, almost pleading for a positive answer.
Zollern did not reply. He did not need to. Both knew the answer clear as the blackness of space. Yes, it would end, but would it end with a Terran defeat?
Bridge
TCS Absolution
Granita System
Captain Powers scowled in his seat as he watched Task Force 212 slowly make its way out of the Granita System. Mighty Commodore Harris ordered the four ships to take the jump point to the Veronica System, the quickest way back to friendly lines. Not going back to Epsilon made enough sense; nobody left alive back there to provide support: but Veronica? That system had two jump points, and the other one would drop them into the Trafalgar System. Traversing the Tanhausen Nebula was not Powers’s idea of a luxury cruise, and no doubt Draaken will be griping the whole way. Too bad. On the plus side, they could scoop hydrogen right out of the giant cloud.
There was not much waiting for them in the Veronica system; an old K-type star, and the second planet was habitable. It, along with the third planet, were home to human colonies. Not Confed; for only a maniac would colonize this deep into the Epsilon Sector. No, it was one of the Border Worlds, a loose collection of independent worlds. At least they style them as such. Either they were a tough lot, or Confed or the Cats found nothing of interest in the system. Aside from the other Jump Point, the one leading to Trafalgar, he knew of nothing worth having in the system. Minerals, he supposed, though the planets could not be that rich in heavy elements, judging from Veronica’s metallicity.
Not that it was of any relevance to Powers. He was just interested in getting his old ship back to friendly lines. The route Task Force 212 was taking would push it all the way back to the Enigma Sector. That irked him. Any direction except forward was enough to irk Powers, but the idea of Confed having to fight in the Enigma Sector again, after already winning a brutal campaign that slashed some of its forces by half– that was almost too much. By the looks on the faces of the bridge crew, it was too much. Their morale hung by a thread, and one more failure would break it utterly.
High pitched beeping from a sensor station snapped Powers out of his brooding. “Report!” he snapped.
Ahead of him and to his right, a young ensign– were all ensigns not you these days?– looked over her shoulder at the Captain. “Sensors picked up incoming Kilrathi, five light-minutes out and closing.”
“Their course?” Chasing the task force would do little good, since Confed ships and the Cats’ do not have a great enough difference in cruising speeds to overtake them before the jump point.
The young ensign– Powers again wondered, this time to wonder if he was ever so young– replied, “They appear to have come through the Charnel Jump point and are headed on an intercept course to Veronica’s.”
“Captain!” called out Ensign Vickers, manning a communication station. “Gemini C-in-C estimated the Kilrathi will intercept us at the Jump point.”
Powers silently cursed their luck. The four Terran ships would have to slow down to below combat speed in order to jump, and would have to do so one at a time. The Cats will have plenty of time to chew them to pieces in the meanwhile. There were no two ways about it; there would be a fight. Powers did not hesitate to act. He glance over at his Combat Operations chief, who was eying his captain with anticipation. “Sound battlestations.”
The Kilrathi braked fast, seven light-seconds out from the jump point, quickly overtaking Abby and her comrades, which were already down to one hundred KPS. Three Cat cruisers and a trio of destroyers wasted little time enter weapons range. Powers would feel much happier if those three cruisers were Fralthis; Abby could match them. Even with modernization, Abby would have a fight on her hands against three Fralthra, even with a Ceres and a pair of Gilgamishes as her own allies.
Powers turned on his communication officer. “Vickers! Any radio noise?”
The black ensign shook his head. “If there is, the Cats have it on tight beam.”
Powers frowned. Mindalo picked up the thoughts of her CO. “They could have sent a beam through the jump point.”
Powers nodded. “Plenty of time to call in reinforcements from Veronica.” With Trafalgar in Terran hands, at least last time the ship’s database was updated, any Kilrathi forces would have already been garrisoned in system. He gave his XO a quizzical look. “Do the Cats even have anything in Veronica?”
Mindalo shrugged, tapping a series of buttons on an optronic pad. “According to the most recent Intel, recently a corvette squadron operated there.”
Which would mean anywhere between nothing and a whole fleet. Powers knew better than to take Intel from the border worlds at face value. The frontiersmen were not the most forthcoming of people. After all, it was no accident that they settled so far from the Sol Sector. Anybody out in the Epsilon Sector did not want to be bothered. Powers scowled at the thought. Well that would be just too bad.
“Lead element of the Kilrathi force will enter missile range in one minute,” announced Commander Kolowski, the Chief of Operations. He had steely eyes and a stone face to match Captain Powers. However, Kolowski was known to joke occasionally, and even to crack a smile. Those were sins Powers would never be caught committing.
“Launch all fighters,” Powers ordered without hesitation.
He was not the only skipper to have such an idea. Reports came across the bridge that Gemini was already launching. Kaitan followed suit. Monrovia held her fighters in reserve. As the lead element of the task force, she would be the first through the jump point. A force without a fighter screen was easy pickings., for whatever might await them on the other side of the jump.
The atmosphere on the bridge shifted from depressed to anxious. Like most soldiers, the crew on Absolution’s bridge preferred to be doing than to be waiting. Crewmen and officers alike were tense. The next few minutes would decide if they should live to fight another day, or if the war would finally be over for them. As sick of war as Powers had grew, he had every intent to live to fight another day.
Kolowski reported that Cats were approaching as two lines; destroyers screening in front of the cruisers. It was a hammer to T.F. 212's single file line; battleship and cruiser with destroyers in front and behind. The Cats could divide the task force if they hit hard enough, but any flag officer worth his rank knew a classic broadside opportunity when he saw one.
“Gemini has given clearance to fire,” Vickers reported. “Repeat, we are clear to fire.”
Powers’s brows came together in annoyance. Permission to fire– how gracious of the Commodore. His gaze shifted to his Chief of Operations. “Arms all missiles and charge the PTCs. You may, of course, fire missiles at will, Kolowski.”
“My pleasure,” Kolowski replied with a sardonic smile.
Powers watched the Kilrathi approach on his own console. The destroyers broke off before all six ships could bring their weapons to bare. Each destroy chose a target; one on Kaitan, one onMonrovia and one on Absolution. The Ralatha was seriously outclassed against any of the three ships, especially against a battleship. The ships was not worth the energy consumed by a phased-transit cannon. A weapon that can destroy a cruiser in a single shot was overkill on a destroyer.
Kolowski issued his own orders, to his weapons’ crew on the bridge, as well as relaying them to launcher and turret crews. On the forward viewer, Powers watched the jagged-looking destroyer jinks and dodge after finishing its own missile run. Four anti-ship missiles sprung forward from jaw-like launchers. Two were immediately shot down by Abby’s fighters– remaining fighters. He was still down a pair of pilots.
The other two missiles were taken out by point-defenses, one too close for comfort. Its explosion slammed into Abby’s shields, though failed to penetrate. Kolowski swore as he watched shield output fluctuate. The Ralatha received worse than it took. Absolution’s forward pulse turret raked the destroyer’s starboard shields, breaching in several places. Abby’s own missiles followed the pulse of million degree plasma in; one missile’s detonation penetrating the shields and slamming into the destroyer. The Ralatha lurched as a kilo of matter interacted with a kilo of antimatter.
On a planet’s surface, the yield produced by such an annihilation would have vaporized a city. Without atmosphere to transfer heat and shock, detonations in space lacked the potency. Space was the ultimate heat sink, and much of the explosion’s potential radiated away from the ship. Enough remained, however, to slag the starboard armor of the destroyer, reducing it to a melted and charred wreck. The ship still lived, but with half its combat potential destroyed, its skipper had little choice but to limp away.
“Report!” Powers barked.
His Ops Chief obliged. “No damage to us.”
“The others?” Abby’s XO asked.
Kolowski checked his own station. “Kaitan took a hit; and her shields are blinking. Monrovia fought off its attacker with minimal damage.” He paused for an instant. “One of their turrets is damaged.”
“Gemini needs assistance!” Vickers called out, forgetting to add honorifics and rank.
“Commodore Harris is in a bad way,” Kolowski added.
“Let me see!” Powers ordered. The forward viewer shift scenes, this time showing three Kilrathi cruisers converging on Gemini.
“They must want her bad,” Mindalo observed.
“Their CO must consider the Gem to be a bigger threat,” Kolowski offered, instantly regretting his words.
A twitch developed below Powers’s eye, a twitch that appeared when he felt truly annoyed. Three Kilrathi cruisers, heavy cruisers, against one Ceres-class cruiser, and only a lone destroyer sent against his own ship! Powers ground his teeth at the insult. How dare they! How dare the Kilrathi turn their nose up at his ship. Abby was larger than any of the four cruiser, and yet the Cats only gave it the once over. Did they hold his ship in such low regard?
“Kaitan and Monrovia moving to assist.” Kolowski reported that Gemini has suffered some damage, but shields were still holding. With the Kilrathi destroyers regrouping, the two Confed destroyers took that time to come to the aid of the flagship. The Gem was putting up quite the fight, but her own power reserves would soon be exhausted.
Powers slammed his fist down upon his console, unable to stand the insult any further. They think Abby was harmless? Powers scowled; they would soon regret their arrogance. “Kolowski! Target the nearest Fralthra with the PTC and destroy it! Ignore my ship will they?”
Kolowski opened his mouth to reply, but sensibly closed it upon seeing the furry upon Powers’s face. The Captain was mad, and his emotions were clouding his judgement. Sure, the PTCs were there to be used, but they took hours to recharge. Attempts to force energy into the caps, an attempt to speed up recharge, might result in a large explosion. Firing the forward PTC would take it offline for hours. No, he would not remind the captain. After all, the big guns were there to be used.
“You heard the man, Catskill,” Kolowski relayed the order. “Earn your name, and kill that Cat.”
“Will do, sir,” Cat Killer replied.
Powers savored the scene before him. He felt no recoil, no vibration, nothing when the PTC discharged. Instead, he watched a piercingly bright blue sphere leap forward at lightspeed. It slammed into the cruiser’s shields as if they did not even exist, instantly collapsing the shields and overloading the Cats’ generators. The shield did not even slow it. The supercharged pulse laser hit the Kilrathi cruiser, peeling its armor back like an orange, and burrowed into the ship.
One second the Fralthra was pounding away at T.F. 212's flagship. The next moment, it ceased to exist. Vaporized weapon casing and containment equipment released several dozen kilos of antimatter, setting off a sun in everyone’s face. Any hydrogen the PTC blast touched, it instantly fused, adding more energy to the explosion.
The abrupt loss of one of their pack made the other two Kilrathi cruisers sit up and take notice. Firing upon the Gemini ceased and both knife-like ships altered their trajectory. Instead of charging at Abby, as Powers expected– wanted– them to do, the Kilrathi flew on a course that took them away from combat. It was not like the Cats to run so quickly. He had known them to retreat when they thought victory was out of grasp, but their four combat-ready ships remaining could still tear into T.F. 212, and leave it a bloody mess.
“That was easy enough,” Mindelo remarked. Her features were carved with a suspicious look. What she meant to say was that it was too easy.
“I don’t like it,” Powers replied. The Kilrathi were dangerous enough without throwing in unpredictability into the equation.
“We just killed a Fralthra and you don’t like it?” his XO questioned. She kept her voice low as so most of the bridge crew would not overhear.
Powers shook his head. Instead of elaborating, he turned his attention back to Kolowski. “Commander, where are those Cats headed?”
Kolowski checked his station’s readouts. “They’re moving out of weapons range. I’d say they were regrouping and getting ready to come at us full force.”
Powers had to agree with the assessment. Now the Cats knew Absolution packed a mighty punch herself. They could not simply ignore what appeared to be an antique ship. Of course they could not be certain if the forward PTC was her only punch. Powers still had the rear PTC at his disposal. After he ordered another cruiser destroyed, the PTCs would sit idle for hours, waiting to recharge.
Vickers interrupted his Captain’s musings– not that Powers was anywhere near cooking up a decent solution. “Captain, Gemini has ordered all ships proceed to the jump point.”
Powers nodded. Sensible enough; Harris sees a gap in the Kilrathi’s attack and is taking it. That the Cats allowed such a gap worried him. His XO read his mind once again. “You thinking what I’m thinking, Skipper?”
A second nod. “We’re going to have company on the other side of the jump.” What he did not add was that if they did not eliminate that company quickly, the task force would find itself surrounded. Harris had to know, or suspect, the same. One did not command a task force without some sense bouncing around inside his head.
Company or not, Absolution could not simply sit in the Granita System forever. “Recall all fighters, but have the pilots remain in their craft upon landing. Prepare them for immediate launch once in Veronica. Helm, get us in line behind Monrovia, and jump one minute after them. If the Cats have any surprises waiting for us, I don’t want that destroyer alone longer than possible. Prepare to jump.”
Red lights began to flash throughout the ship, speakers blared out ‘Jump Imminent’ alerts. Not even the blind and deaf could miss a jump alert. Powers issued one more order before leaning back in his chair, and preparing his body for the ordeal. “Commander, I want all batteries and launchers ready to fire the moment we’re in system.”
Granita Jump point
Veronica System
No matter how many times over the course of however many years, Powers could never get use to the jump. Being in two places at once was more than a figure of speech when traveling between systems. Most of the time, he always felt like his stomach either arrived before, or left after, the rest of him. Once he found himself whole again, the bloody thing still wanted to climb up his throat. The only person Powers knew who did not feel like losing their lunch after a jump was his XO. Mindalo was one tough customer, no denying that.
Powers blinked rapidly and tried to shake the dizziness from his head. “Report!” His command sounded less firm than he would have liked.
So was the response. “Jump successful.” At least there was that–
“Captain!” Cried out a navigator. “Debris dead ahead.”
Powers’s vision came back to him, and he saw that largest piece of scrap metal in his life siting directly in front of him on the viewer. It was not just an inert chunk of metal, but one that still blossomed with fire and explosions.
“Dive!” he commanded, leaping from his chair. The shock of seeing Monrovia broken before him gave him one of the few lapses in his cold and calm persona.
Collision alerts blared through the ship as Absolution dove as sharply as the old girl was capable. Not sharp enough; the dorsal turret was sheered off, a violent shudder ran through the ship. Depressurization alarms followed the collision alerts as pressure doors slammed shut across the ship. Powers ground his teeth at the sound. His composure was regained, and he did not show the same fear and alarm as some of his bridge crew. There was little point. Had the ship not dove as sharply as she could, Monrovia would have taken the whole bridge structure along with turret.
Powers briefly cursed the man who designed a starship with a bridge so exposed before turning back to his crew. “Report!” he ordered again. “What happened to Monrovia?” More over, what happened to Sydney. Now there was a good captain, who probably never knew what hit her. Powers hissed in dismay. His only regret was that Kaitan was not the first ship through; she had a captain Powers would not have been sorry to see dead.
Part of his question was answered. Kolowski reported. “Captain! Two Fralthra at one O’clock high.”
“Give me a firing solution,” Powers ordered. With an added thought. “Launch all fighters!” The last thing Abby needed was a barrage of anti-ship missiles. This was precisely what she received.
Before even the first fighter clearing the launch deck, both Kilrathi cruisers opened up upon Absolution. “Incoming missiles!” Powers gave the order to destroy them, one that was unnecessary. After so many years of training, and crewman in Confed knew to destroy incoming missiles. Epees and pulse turrets pounded away at the incoming missiles, knocking most of them out of space before they became a threat. Most was not all, and three of the missiles hit Abby’s shields.
More alarms sounded on the bridge. “Shields are still holding,” Kolowski reported, much to the relief of the bridge crew. It was but the first barrage, and both Cat ships dove on Absolution, firing off a second salvo of missiles. This time, only two missiles breached the anti-missile barrage. Two proved to be one too many. The first missiles detonated against the shield. The second followed microseconds later. The explosion was kept at bay, but not before sending ripples through the forward shields.
It was enough of a ripple to let pulse fire from the lead Fralthra’s turrets to punch through the shields. Powers staggered back into his seat as his ship rocked around him. Depressurization alarms returned to the cacophony of sounds bombarding Powers’s ears. With Abby’s compartments already sealed, only those within the damaged areas need to fear hull breaches. No doubt, more than a few were already dead in vacuum.
Abby proved not to be such a defenseless victim as Monrovia. As the Kilrathi fired upon her, Absolution returned the favor. With each salvo she pushed the pair of Cats back from the Jump point. Her own forward turrets returned plasma to the Kilrathi. The two forward beam weapons let loose a stream from the grasers, slicing through one of the Fralthra’s shields. The ship’s bow began to melt under the high energy bombardment, but even this did not thwart the Kilrathi.
“Gemini has jumped in,” Vickers reported. “They are moving to engage the Fralthras.”
The second ship jumping into the system seemed to surprise the Cats. If they ambushed Monrovia so successfully, clearly they must have known what was coming through. Perhaps they were startled that Abby was still alive when Gemini appeared. With a second ship in system, the Kilrathi divided their forces, pulling one cruiser off Absolution. It was the opening Powers would not waste.
“Kolowski, give them a full missile spread, followed up by all forward turrets,” Powers ordered.
Powers sat back and watched the results of his orders upon the viewer. Most missiles were shot down, but not all. Enough made it through to damage the cruiser’s shields. These impacts were followed by a barrage of plasma pulses and two steady streams of stimulated gamma rays. Gemini added her own fire to Cat, ripping it shields away like an old curtain. The Fralthra exploded as Gemini’smissiles passed the shields unopposed and penetrated the ship’s armor. Once inside the hull, the containment fields around the missiles’ anti-matter disengaged. The explosion was bright enough to short out some of Abby’s sensors, sending a cloud of burnt insolation through the bridge as one terminal blew out.
Most of the Fralthra was simply gone; the rest, a charred and lifeless hulk drifting in space. The second Cat ship took that as a hint, and turned its back upon the two Confederation warships. Its engines powered up to cruising speed, but not before unleashing one last salvo.
“Incoming missiles!” reported one of the sensor crew, mere seconds before correcting himself. “Scratch that.”
Powers thought with relief it was but a sensor glitch. At least he did for an instant. “Wait, they’re back–“
”Skippers!” Kolowski hollered. “We have incoming Skippers.”
“Get those Epees on them!” Powers ordered. That was, after all, what these point-defense fighters were designed to kill. Skippers were one of the Cats’ more ingenious ideas. Sure, they had fighters that could cloak, but only a handful. Too much energy was required to cloak fighters, far more than what was needed to cloak a missile. The Kilrathi added this technology to some of their anti-ship missiles. The name Skipper came from the fact these missiles had to decloak periodically to regain lock. If not for the need of accuracy, Confed would have been in serious trouble when the Cats started lobbing Skippers around.
Abby’s fighters did their job, and did it well. All eight of the Skippers were destroyed well outside of Absolution’s shield radius. Only after the threat was declared removed did Gemini hailAbsolution. Harris’s old face appeared on Powers’s chair console. “Report Captain!”
“Abby’s hurt, Commodore,” Powers stated the obvious. “We’ll have to patch up a few holes over here before we can move on. I lost a few good men and women today.”
“And Monrovia?” Harris asked, though the sensors over on the Gem were in far better shape than Abby’s.
“Destroyed,” any ship with eyes could tell that. “Nearly took the bridge off my ship when we jumped in. My guess is the Cats killed her the second she appeared.” Powers glanced away from the Commodore and barked at his own crew. “Scan for escape pods, shuttled and any of her fighters.” Both he and the Commodore knew that if Monrovia was killed the second she completed jump that there would be no survivors. Still, as cold-blooded as Powers could be, he would not just abandon any survivors.
Harris’s features looked even older at the thought. “Captain, as soon as Kaitan is through, deploy all the mines you have left.”
Powers glanced over at his own tactical stations. “Kolowski, relay the order.”
“Yes sir,” he said, before proceeding to bark at his own underlings.
“Captain, I’ll confer with my Captains in an hour,” Harris said before cutting his connection.
Chapter 5
Medical Center
TCS Absolution
Granita System
Of all the bays and rooms inside Abby, the medical wards were by far the nicest. The most modern. At least that was the way Zollern viewed them. It was a far cry from the corridors leading to it, with its flickering light, and missing ceiling panel. That panel was likely borrowed to patch up something else in the elderly battleship. It would not be the first time, and assuming they lived to see another day, would not be the last. Consoles inside the center were all fully functional and back-lit. The walls were as smooth as a ship just launched. Some places he could even see a partial reflection.
As with missing panels outside, his own visit was not his first, and probably not his last. The lull before the storm finally broke, and not even a successful raid against a nest of traitors could save the levee. The Chief of Security muttered curses beneath his breath for the tenth time this morning. Another crewmember decided upon a premature retirement, this time one of the gunnery crew. With the task force still well behind enemy lines, Abby needed every able bodied man tending her weapons.
Zollern took some solace in knowing he was not the only person who did not want him to be here. Lieutenant Commander Mirat only just finished tapping in her report on a piece of smart paper, a plastic device thin enough one could almost see through it. “Another senseless death,” she muttered, whether to herself of to Zollern, was unclear.
Zollern nodded. “Indeed.” He knew a very few sensible deaths. Without war raging all around, death would just be a part of life. For the past thirty-five years, it has dominated life. Senseless deaths were one of the few subjects the two could agree upon.
“I assume you want a report zapped to your desk?” Mirat asked. Her eyes pierced him like cold knives, though not the frigid cometary stare she usually gave the Marine. Aside from anger, be it at him personally or the state of the Confederation in general, Zollern saw much exhaustion in those eyes. He could think of not a soul onboard the Absolution who was not closed to being burned out– except maybe the resident Cats.
“Cause of death?” Zollern asked, his tone all business. He already knew the answer, discovered in the course of his investigation. This death had enough witnesses.
Mirat frowned, knowing he already knew the answer. She too went through the motions. “A clean death, for the most part. Grabbed a live power cable in his battery, completely failure of neurological activity within seconds.”
Since his fellow gunners watched him lunge at the wire, there was no doubt in Zollern’s mind this was no accident. There was also no room for doubt that the Captain would be displeased upon receiving the official report. “Another report to send Powers.”
“He won’t be happy,” Mirat stated the obvious. Anybody who served under Maxwell Powers knew he was never happy.
“I’ve never known him to be,” Zollern responded, following up his own though.
Mirat pursed her lips, dissatisfied. “Captain Powers has been through a lot this past year. The losses might be a little too much for you to comprehend. Sir.” She added the honorific a step too slow after scalding him.
Zollern’s eyes narrowed to a glare, burning away at the medical officer. “I’m sure Ellie would disagree with you.” He said, his voice as cold as her frequent stares.
The name did not register for a moment, and when it did, her cheeks reddened and Mirat turned her gaze away. “My apologies, Colonel. I’ve spoken before thinking.” All of Abby’s higher ranking crew read Zollern’s file when he transferred onboard, and all knew about his wife. By her tone, Mirat sounded genuinely sorry for her words.
Zollern made a quick wave of his hand, dismissing the issue. “It don’t mean nothing,” he gave the typical T.C.M.C. response to the loss of a close friend and comrade to the Cats. If Repleetah did anything for Zollern, it put him on a first-name basis with Death. For a wonder, Mirat made no snappy comeback to the Marine Corp’s callous attitude regarding the inevitable.
Zollern quickly changed the subject. He can think of many topics he would rather discuss than the loss of the only woman he considered worth marrying. It was only fortune that she ventured to Sirius Prime to visit relatives, and did not take their daughter along. Zollern glared over at one of the active consoles. “Any news on the mainframe we liberated?”
Mirat raised an eyebrow at his ironic choice of words. “Liberated,” she muttered with a smirk. She then shook her head. “No, Colonel. If I understand the techs correctly, there is not a single bit of information on the Life-Eater Virus.” It was a bulky name for a disease, even an engineered one, in Mirat’s opinion. However, she could not control how it was translated from Kilrathi.
Zollern scowled, suddenly wanting to hit that same console he looked upon. “So it was all for nothing,” he grumbled. Perhaps nothing was an exaggeration; they did wipe out that nest of traitors. Not much of a return on the investment, and no doubt at least one of them sent out word to their overlords.
Mirat did not argue. “As far as I, or any of the medical staff can determine, the Mandarins were vaccinated or isolated. It would have helped if you could have brought back some of them alive. Dead even; we could learn a bit from an autopsy.”
Zollern sighed. There was one thing he learned about this war that raged across generations: “I’m sure we’ll have another chance to see this virus.” One way or another.
Mirat frowned as she studied the Marine. She thought the same as he; they would see it again when the Kilrathi bomb another world with it. “Will it ever end?” she asked, almost pleading for a positive answer.
Zollern did not reply. He did not need to. Both knew the answer clear as the blackness of space. Yes, it would end, but would it end with a Terran defeat?
Bridge
TCS Absolution
Granita System
Captain Powers scowled in his seat as he watched Task Force 212 slowly make its way out of the Granita System. Mighty Commodore Harris ordered the four ships to take the jump point to the Veronica System, the quickest way back to friendly lines. Not going back to Epsilon made enough sense; nobody left alive back there to provide support: but Veronica? That system had two jump points, and the other one would drop them into the Trafalgar System. Traversing the Tanhausen Nebula was not Powers’s idea of a luxury cruise, and no doubt Draaken will be griping the whole way. Too bad. On the plus side, they could scoop hydrogen right out of the giant cloud.
There was not much waiting for them in the Veronica system; an old K-type star, and the second planet was habitable. It, along with the third planet, were home to human colonies. Not Confed; for only a maniac would colonize this deep into the Epsilon Sector. No, it was one of the Border Worlds, a loose collection of independent worlds. At least they style them as such. Either they were a tough lot, or Confed or the Cats found nothing of interest in the system. Aside from the other Jump Point, the one leading to Trafalgar, he knew of nothing worth having in the system. Minerals, he supposed, though the planets could not be that rich in heavy elements, judging from Veronica’s metallicity.
Not that it was of any relevance to Powers. He was just interested in getting his old ship back to friendly lines. The route Task Force 212 was taking would push it all the way back to the Enigma Sector. That irked him. Any direction except forward was enough to irk Powers, but the idea of Confed having to fight in the Enigma Sector again, after already winning a brutal campaign that slashed some of its forces by half– that was almost too much. By the looks on the faces of the bridge crew, it was too much. Their morale hung by a thread, and one more failure would break it utterly.
High pitched beeping from a sensor station snapped Powers out of his brooding. “Report!” he snapped.
Ahead of him and to his right, a young ensign– were all ensigns not you these days?– looked over her shoulder at the Captain. “Sensors picked up incoming Kilrathi, five light-minutes out and closing.”
“Their course?” Chasing the task force would do little good, since Confed ships and the Cats’ do not have a great enough difference in cruising speeds to overtake them before the jump point.
The young ensign– Powers again wondered, this time to wonder if he was ever so young– replied, “They appear to have come through the Charnel Jump point and are headed on an intercept course to Veronica’s.”
“Captain!” called out Ensign Vickers, manning a communication station. “Gemini C-in-C estimated the Kilrathi will intercept us at the Jump point.”
Powers silently cursed their luck. The four Terran ships would have to slow down to below combat speed in order to jump, and would have to do so one at a time. The Cats will have plenty of time to chew them to pieces in the meanwhile. There were no two ways about it; there would be a fight. Powers did not hesitate to act. He glance over at his Combat Operations chief, who was eying his captain with anticipation. “Sound battlestations.”
The Kilrathi braked fast, seven light-seconds out from the jump point, quickly overtaking Abby and her comrades, which were already down to one hundred KPS. Three Cat cruisers and a trio of destroyers wasted little time enter weapons range. Powers would feel much happier if those three cruisers were Fralthis; Abby could match them. Even with modernization, Abby would have a fight on her hands against three Fralthra, even with a Ceres and a pair of Gilgamishes as her own allies.
Powers turned on his communication officer. “Vickers! Any radio noise?”
The black ensign shook his head. “If there is, the Cats have it on tight beam.”
Powers frowned. Mindalo picked up the thoughts of her CO. “They could have sent a beam through the jump point.”
Powers nodded. “Plenty of time to call in reinforcements from Veronica.” With Trafalgar in Terran hands, at least last time the ship’s database was updated, any Kilrathi forces would have already been garrisoned in system. He gave his XO a quizzical look. “Do the Cats even have anything in Veronica?”
Mindalo shrugged, tapping a series of buttons on an optronic pad. “According to the most recent Intel, recently a corvette squadron operated there.”
Which would mean anywhere between nothing and a whole fleet. Powers knew better than to take Intel from the border worlds at face value. The frontiersmen were not the most forthcoming of people. After all, it was no accident that they settled so far from the Sol Sector. Anybody out in the Epsilon Sector did not want to be bothered. Powers scowled at the thought. Well that would be just too bad.
“Lead element of the Kilrathi force will enter missile range in one minute,” announced Commander Kolowski, the Chief of Operations. He had steely eyes and a stone face to match Captain Powers. However, Kolowski was known to joke occasionally, and even to crack a smile. Those were sins Powers would never be caught committing.
“Launch all fighters,” Powers ordered without hesitation.
He was not the only skipper to have such an idea. Reports came across the bridge that Gemini was already launching. Kaitan followed suit. Monrovia held her fighters in reserve. As the lead element of the task force, she would be the first through the jump point. A force without a fighter screen was easy pickings., for whatever might await them on the other side of the jump.
The atmosphere on the bridge shifted from depressed to anxious. Like most soldiers, the crew on Absolution’s bridge preferred to be doing than to be waiting. Crewmen and officers alike were tense. The next few minutes would decide if they should live to fight another day, or if the war would finally be over for them. As sick of war as Powers had grew, he had every intent to live to fight another day.
Kolowski reported that Cats were approaching as two lines; destroyers screening in front of the cruisers. It was a hammer to T.F. 212's single file line; battleship and cruiser with destroyers in front and behind. The Cats could divide the task force if they hit hard enough, but any flag officer worth his rank knew a classic broadside opportunity when he saw one.
“Gemini has given clearance to fire,” Vickers reported. “Repeat, we are clear to fire.”
Powers’s brows came together in annoyance. Permission to fire– how gracious of the Commodore. His gaze shifted to his Chief of Operations. “Arms all missiles and charge the PTCs. You may, of course, fire missiles at will, Kolowski.”
“My pleasure,” Kolowski replied with a sardonic smile.
Powers watched the Kilrathi approach on his own console. The destroyers broke off before all six ships could bring their weapons to bare. Each destroy chose a target; one on Kaitan, one onMonrovia and one on Absolution. The Ralatha was seriously outclassed against any of the three ships, especially against a battleship. The ships was not worth the energy consumed by a phased-transit cannon. A weapon that can destroy a cruiser in a single shot was overkill on a destroyer.
Kolowski issued his own orders, to his weapons’ crew on the bridge, as well as relaying them to launcher and turret crews. On the forward viewer, Powers watched the jagged-looking destroyer jinks and dodge after finishing its own missile run. Four anti-ship missiles sprung forward from jaw-like launchers. Two were immediately shot down by Abby’s fighters– remaining fighters. He was still down a pair of pilots.
The other two missiles were taken out by point-defenses, one too close for comfort. Its explosion slammed into Abby’s shields, though failed to penetrate. Kolowski swore as he watched shield output fluctuate. The Ralatha received worse than it took. Absolution’s forward pulse turret raked the destroyer’s starboard shields, breaching in several places. Abby’s own missiles followed the pulse of million degree plasma in; one missile’s detonation penetrating the shields and slamming into the destroyer. The Ralatha lurched as a kilo of matter interacted with a kilo of antimatter.
On a planet’s surface, the yield produced by such an annihilation would have vaporized a city. Without atmosphere to transfer heat and shock, detonations in space lacked the potency. Space was the ultimate heat sink, and much of the explosion’s potential radiated away from the ship. Enough remained, however, to slag the starboard armor of the destroyer, reducing it to a melted and charred wreck. The ship still lived, but with half its combat potential destroyed, its skipper had little choice but to limp away.
“Report!” Powers barked.
His Ops Chief obliged. “No damage to us.”
“The others?” Abby’s XO asked.
Kolowski checked his own station. “Kaitan took a hit; and her shields are blinking. Monrovia fought off its attacker with minimal damage.” He paused for an instant. “One of their turrets is damaged.”
“Gemini needs assistance!” Vickers called out, forgetting to add honorifics and rank.
“Commodore Harris is in a bad way,” Kolowski added.
“Let me see!” Powers ordered. The forward viewer shift scenes, this time showing three Kilrathi cruisers converging on Gemini.
“They must want her bad,” Mindalo observed.
“Their CO must consider the Gem to be a bigger threat,” Kolowski offered, instantly regretting his words.
A twitch developed below Powers’s eye, a twitch that appeared when he felt truly annoyed. Three Kilrathi cruisers, heavy cruisers, against one Ceres-class cruiser, and only a lone destroyer sent against his own ship! Powers ground his teeth at the insult. How dare they! How dare the Kilrathi turn their nose up at his ship. Abby was larger than any of the four cruiser, and yet the Cats only gave it the once over. Did they hold his ship in such low regard?
“Kaitan and Monrovia moving to assist.” Kolowski reported that Gemini has suffered some damage, but shields were still holding. With the Kilrathi destroyers regrouping, the two Confed destroyers took that time to come to the aid of the flagship. The Gem was putting up quite the fight, but her own power reserves would soon be exhausted.
Powers slammed his fist down upon his console, unable to stand the insult any further. They think Abby was harmless? Powers scowled; they would soon regret their arrogance. “Kolowski! Target the nearest Fralthra with the PTC and destroy it! Ignore my ship will they?”
Kolowski opened his mouth to reply, but sensibly closed it upon seeing the furry upon Powers’s face. The Captain was mad, and his emotions were clouding his judgement. Sure, the PTCs were there to be used, but they took hours to recharge. Attempts to force energy into the caps, an attempt to speed up recharge, might result in a large explosion. Firing the forward PTC would take it offline for hours. No, he would not remind the captain. After all, the big guns were there to be used.
“You heard the man, Catskill,” Kolowski relayed the order. “Earn your name, and kill that Cat.”
“Will do, sir,” Cat Killer replied.
Powers savored the scene before him. He felt no recoil, no vibration, nothing when the PTC discharged. Instead, he watched a piercingly bright blue sphere leap forward at lightspeed. It slammed into the cruiser’s shields as if they did not even exist, instantly collapsing the shields and overloading the Cats’ generators. The shield did not even slow it. The supercharged pulse laser hit the Kilrathi cruiser, peeling its armor back like an orange, and burrowed into the ship.
One second the Fralthra was pounding away at T.F. 212's flagship. The next moment, it ceased to exist. Vaporized weapon casing and containment equipment released several dozen kilos of antimatter, setting off a sun in everyone’s face. Any hydrogen the PTC blast touched, it instantly fused, adding more energy to the explosion.
The abrupt loss of one of their pack made the other two Kilrathi cruisers sit up and take notice. Firing upon the Gemini ceased and both knife-like ships altered their trajectory. Instead of charging at Abby, as Powers expected– wanted– them to do, the Kilrathi flew on a course that took them away from combat. It was not like the Cats to run so quickly. He had known them to retreat when they thought victory was out of grasp, but their four combat-ready ships remaining could still tear into T.F. 212, and leave it a bloody mess.
“That was easy enough,” Mindelo remarked. Her features were carved with a suspicious look. What she meant to say was that it was too easy.
“I don’t like it,” Powers replied. The Kilrathi were dangerous enough without throwing in unpredictability into the equation.
“We just killed a Fralthra and you don’t like it?” his XO questioned. She kept her voice low as so most of the bridge crew would not overhear.
Powers shook his head. Instead of elaborating, he turned his attention back to Kolowski. “Commander, where are those Cats headed?”
Kolowski checked his station’s readouts. “They’re moving out of weapons range. I’d say they were regrouping and getting ready to come at us full force.”
Powers had to agree with the assessment. Now the Cats knew Absolution packed a mighty punch herself. They could not simply ignore what appeared to be an antique ship. Of course they could not be certain if the forward PTC was her only punch. Powers still had the rear PTC at his disposal. After he ordered another cruiser destroyed, the PTCs would sit idle for hours, waiting to recharge.
Vickers interrupted his Captain’s musings– not that Powers was anywhere near cooking up a decent solution. “Captain, Gemini has ordered all ships proceed to the jump point.”
Powers nodded. Sensible enough; Harris sees a gap in the Kilrathi’s attack and is taking it. That the Cats allowed such a gap worried him. His XO read his mind once again. “You thinking what I’m thinking, Skipper?”
A second nod. “We’re going to have company on the other side of the jump.” What he did not add was that if they did not eliminate that company quickly, the task force would find itself surrounded. Harris had to know, or suspect, the same. One did not command a task force without some sense bouncing around inside his head.
Company or not, Absolution could not simply sit in the Granita System forever. “Recall all fighters, but have the pilots remain in their craft upon landing. Prepare them for immediate launch once in Veronica. Helm, get us in line behind Monrovia, and jump one minute after them. If the Cats have any surprises waiting for us, I don’t want that destroyer alone longer than possible. Prepare to jump.”
Red lights began to flash throughout the ship, speakers blared out ‘Jump Imminent’ alerts. Not even the blind and deaf could miss a jump alert. Powers issued one more order before leaning back in his chair, and preparing his body for the ordeal. “Commander, I want all batteries and launchers ready to fire the moment we’re in system.”
Granita Jump point
Veronica System
No matter how many times over the course of however many years, Powers could never get use to the jump. Being in two places at once was more than a figure of speech when traveling between systems. Most of the time, he always felt like his stomach either arrived before, or left after, the rest of him. Once he found himself whole again, the bloody thing still wanted to climb up his throat. The only person Powers knew who did not feel like losing their lunch after a jump was his XO. Mindalo was one tough customer, no denying that.
Powers blinked rapidly and tried to shake the dizziness from his head. “Report!” His command sounded less firm than he would have liked.
So was the response. “Jump successful.” At least there was that–
“Captain!” Cried out a navigator. “Debris dead ahead.”
Powers’s vision came back to him, and he saw that largest piece of scrap metal in his life siting directly in front of him on the viewer. It was not just an inert chunk of metal, but one that still blossomed with fire and explosions.
“Dive!” he commanded, leaping from his chair. The shock of seeing Monrovia broken before him gave him one of the few lapses in his cold and calm persona.
Collision alerts blared through the ship as Absolution dove as sharply as the old girl was capable. Not sharp enough; the dorsal turret was sheered off, a violent shudder ran through the ship. Depressurization alarms followed the collision alerts as pressure doors slammed shut across the ship. Powers ground his teeth at the sound. His composure was regained, and he did not show the same fear and alarm as some of his bridge crew. There was little point. Had the ship not dove as sharply as she could, Monrovia would have taken the whole bridge structure along with turret.
Powers briefly cursed the man who designed a starship with a bridge so exposed before turning back to his crew. “Report!” he ordered again. “What happened to Monrovia?” More over, what happened to Sydney. Now there was a good captain, who probably never knew what hit her. Powers hissed in dismay. His only regret was that Kaitan was not the first ship through; she had a captain Powers would not have been sorry to see dead.
Part of his question was answered. Kolowski reported. “Captain! Two Fralthra at one O’clock high.”
“Give me a firing solution,” Powers ordered. With an added thought. “Launch all fighters!” The last thing Abby needed was a barrage of anti-ship missiles. This was precisely what she received.
Before even the first fighter clearing the launch deck, both Kilrathi cruisers opened up upon Absolution. “Incoming missiles!” Powers gave the order to destroy them, one that was unnecessary. After so many years of training, and crewman in Confed knew to destroy incoming missiles. Epees and pulse turrets pounded away at the incoming missiles, knocking most of them out of space before they became a threat. Most was not all, and three of the missiles hit Abby’s shields.
More alarms sounded on the bridge. “Shields are still holding,” Kolowski reported, much to the relief of the bridge crew. It was but the first barrage, and both Cat ships dove on Absolution, firing off a second salvo of missiles. This time, only two missiles breached the anti-missile barrage. Two proved to be one too many. The first missiles detonated against the shield. The second followed microseconds later. The explosion was kept at bay, but not before sending ripples through the forward shields.
It was enough of a ripple to let pulse fire from the lead Fralthra’s turrets to punch through the shields. Powers staggered back into his seat as his ship rocked around him. Depressurization alarms returned to the cacophony of sounds bombarding Powers’s ears. With Abby’s compartments already sealed, only those within the damaged areas need to fear hull breaches. No doubt, more than a few were already dead in vacuum.
Abby proved not to be such a defenseless victim as Monrovia. As the Kilrathi fired upon her, Absolution returned the favor. With each salvo she pushed the pair of Cats back from the Jump point. Her own forward turrets returned plasma to the Kilrathi. The two forward beam weapons let loose a stream from the grasers, slicing through one of the Fralthra’s shields. The ship’s bow began to melt under the high energy bombardment, but even this did not thwart the Kilrathi.
“Gemini has jumped in,” Vickers reported. “They are moving to engage the Fralthras.”
The second ship jumping into the system seemed to surprise the Cats. If they ambushed Monrovia so successfully, clearly they must have known what was coming through. Perhaps they were startled that Abby was still alive when Gemini appeared. With a second ship in system, the Kilrathi divided their forces, pulling one cruiser off Absolution. It was the opening Powers would not waste.
“Kolowski, give them a full missile spread, followed up by all forward turrets,” Powers ordered.
Powers sat back and watched the results of his orders upon the viewer. Most missiles were shot down, but not all. Enough made it through to damage the cruiser’s shields. These impacts were followed by a barrage of plasma pulses and two steady streams of stimulated gamma rays. Gemini added her own fire to Cat, ripping it shields away like an old curtain. The Fralthra exploded as Gemini’smissiles passed the shields unopposed and penetrated the ship’s armor. Once inside the hull, the containment fields around the missiles’ anti-matter disengaged. The explosion was bright enough to short out some of Abby’s sensors, sending a cloud of burnt insolation through the bridge as one terminal blew out.
Most of the Fralthra was simply gone; the rest, a charred and lifeless hulk drifting in space. The second Cat ship took that as a hint, and turned its back upon the two Confederation warships. Its engines powered up to cruising speed, but not before unleashing one last salvo.
“Incoming missiles!” reported one of the sensor crew, mere seconds before correcting himself. “Scratch that.”
Powers thought with relief it was but a sensor glitch. At least he did for an instant. “Wait, they’re back–“
”Skippers!” Kolowski hollered. “We have incoming Skippers.”
“Get those Epees on them!” Powers ordered. That was, after all, what these point-defense fighters were designed to kill. Skippers were one of the Cats’ more ingenious ideas. Sure, they had fighters that could cloak, but only a handful. Too much energy was required to cloak fighters, far more than what was needed to cloak a missile. The Kilrathi added this technology to some of their anti-ship missiles. The name Skipper came from the fact these missiles had to decloak periodically to regain lock. If not for the need of accuracy, Confed would have been in serious trouble when the Cats started lobbing Skippers around.
Abby’s fighters did their job, and did it well. All eight of the Skippers were destroyed well outside of Absolution’s shield radius. Only after the threat was declared removed did Gemini hailAbsolution. Harris’s old face appeared on Powers’s chair console. “Report Captain!”
“Abby’s hurt, Commodore,” Powers stated the obvious. “We’ll have to patch up a few holes over here before we can move on. I lost a few good men and women today.”
“And Monrovia?” Harris asked, though the sensors over on the Gem were in far better shape than Abby’s.
“Destroyed,” any ship with eyes could tell that. “Nearly took the bridge off my ship when we jumped in. My guess is the Cats killed her the second she appeared.” Powers glanced away from the Commodore and barked at his own crew. “Scan for escape pods, shuttled and any of her fighters.” Both he and the Commodore knew that if Monrovia was killed the second she completed jump that there would be no survivors. Still, as cold-blooded as Powers could be, he would not just abandon any survivors.
Harris’s features looked even older at the thought. “Captain, as soon as Kaitan is through, deploy all the mines you have left.”
Powers glanced over at his own tactical stations. “Kolowski, relay the order.”
“Yes sir,” he said, before proceeding to bark at his own underlings.
“Captain, I’ll confer with my Captains in an hour,” Harris said before cutting his connection.