Archaea 3: Red (18 page)

“Sir, I have a firing solution on screen now.” she said immediately.

“It looks good to me, Captain” I said, confirming the shot.

“Very well, s
tand by.” he paused, and opened comms. “Unidentified vessels, you have 10 seconds to alter course.”

Pauli and I star
ted counting down, taking turns.

“Ten...” 

“Nine...”

“Eight... “

“Seven...”

“That's enough, kids. I see the clock. Janis, stand by.”

“I am standing by, sir.”

We all stood by for a brief
moment as the clock raced towards the inevitable. “Janis, fire for effect.”

“Firing for effect, aye” she said immediately, as both turrets lit up, pouring streams of plasma into both ships, tearing into their stern tubes. We could see the shock waves from the kinetic impacts, and watched as the stern quarter of each vessel turned into a glittering cloud of debris. Both vessels were soon slowly tumbling and streaming sparks and sizable chunks of their aft sections.

“Sir, fire mission is complete.”

“Outstanding Janis, great shooing as always”, he called across the bridge, then clicked open the 1MC. “
All hands, secure from battle stations, power down to nominal. We are at material condition x-ray at this time. ”

“Sir, we're in range of
their network now”, Pauli called out a few moments later as we pulled past their hulks.

“They still have networks?”

“Yes sir, Janis was very selective” he replied with a smirk.

“Very well Pauli, dig in - one moment son,” he clicked on comms. “MOC, Archaea.”

“Archaea, Mars Orbital Control, we copy.”

“MOC, we tried to make contact, but were unable to do so. In light of their hostile response, I felt it best to remove their maneuvering capabilities and leave them for you to deal with. Our best guesstimate is
that their current orbit will be stable for approximately fourteen hours, over.”

A slight pause filled the channel with a low hiss.
“Archaea, we copy. Interceptors are inbound and will take custody. Good shooting, over.”

“
Thanks, MOC – Archaea out.”

We had a few moments of
quiet calm and silence on the bridge, as Mars slowly rolled past, filling the starboard quarter.

“I sure wish I knew why people were shooting at us so much.” Captain Smith said thoughtfully. “I mean, it's not like we make a habit of making enemies around here.”

“Criminal syndicates in this system might not like us very much right now”, I mused.

“Good point
, Yak. Pauli, what did you find in their networks… anything juicy?”

“Not really sir. They are
semi-independents, ownership registered to an LLC named Deimos Enterprises, which appears to be at least partly owned by what looks like a cut-out corporation named Sol-Sys Partners. Nothing really special on their network at all, just ship systems, manifests, receipts. It doesn't look like they use their network for much besides a glorified filing cabinet.”

“No rogue AI lurking in there?”

Pauli laughed. “Not that I can see, sir. I have another idea, however...” he trailed off momentarily. “Bingo! I just cross-referenced their registry numbers against the local message exchange, and apparently… we have a bounty on our heads, sir.”

“Cool! How much
are we worth?”

“One million credits. The bounty is
coded and doesn’t reference us by name, but it does list our transponder and tonnage, and describes us as a light-frigate, unknown armament.”

“
That sounds about right. You’re right, Yak, we're not exactly making friends in Sol space.” he chuckled. “Well, if that's how they want to play. Pauli, is there any way to trace that message?”

“Ordinarily, no, but
Janis is working on it sir. If it was posted through a node she was resident in, she ought to be able to replay the packet and trace it back. It's not immediate, though sir. It takes time to propagate the request.”

“
Well, that sounds good Pauli. Let me know when you know.” He stretched, then mashed the 1MC. “Well folks, it looks like we may not have many friends among the criminal element of this system, though I know that's not really a big surprise. We're just about done hooking Mars, and we will be lining up the final leg of our course in about nine minutes.” 

I worked a bit more on my
slightly stale, almost-forgotten sandwich, and took in the sight of Mars rolling past. We had crossed the terminator, and the major metropolitan areas of Elysium, Eunostos, and Xanthe shone like sparkling patches of humanity; bright against the bitter cold and dark of the Martian night below.

As we completed our partial orbit and came out from behind Mars, the furious glare of Sol flashed full through the forward port. We all cringed and looked away while the port filters adjusted. Despite the purple afterimage dancing in my eyes, a flashing border on my screen caught my attention.

“Sir, Master 2 is onscreen again, range 1.8 million kilometers at 110.” I scrolled their projected course forward. “It looks like they're on an approach vector to our current course, though our rendezvous is pretty far, sir – just a bit over 2.3 million kilometers.”

“That's not very far at all, considering the speed we're carrying a
t the moment, Yak. Any sign of the Clairvoyant?”

“One moment sir
, I am looking now.” I swiped through the target list. Mars space was pretty full, and with our new gravimetrics, Janis was plotting mass characteristics for targets farther away than I want to look – she must have taken pity on me, and lit up a distant target with a flashing yellow border for me to ‘find’.

“Sir, they're pretty far off, but it looks like they're on the trail of Master 2.”

“Very well Yak, what range?”

“
They’re a smidge under 4.8 million clicks, at 123 sir. They're closing the distance, but not very quickly.”

“Well, at least
they’re on the chase.” he said calmly.

I was amazed at the resolution I could get at that range. Our old sensors would have registered the mass, roughly, but there would be nothing on the topology. Our new gear was just fantastic. Even at that range, I could easily scope right in. The Clairvoyant was a light corvette-class vessel, sleek and narrow, a little smaller than the Archaea, but not by much.

I spent some time on those birds, attached to orbital security on Croft for a few months. I remembered the smell most of all, the ozone smell of low-bid electronics at the edge of meltdown, the sweat and tight quarters. More than that, I remember the skull-crushing boredom of doing nothing but holding my bunk down, week after week, pumping iron and trying not to choke out my subordinates.

I took some consolation in the fact that even though they were pretty far behind the fight, there was almost certainly a squad of incredibly bored, incredibly well trained devil dogs waiting for their moment to kick doors and check corners.

“Janis, dear, this reminds me. Did you miss your million-click shot on Master 2?” Captain Smith asked smugly.

“Certai
nly not, sir”, Janis replied curtly. “That fire mission has not yet completed. We still have 385 seconds remaining.”

I looked over at Pauli, and he was grinning from ear to proverbial ear.

*****

With the slingshot complete, engineering was pretty calm. Our reac drives were charged just enough to keep the plates warm, and the tokamak was barely lit, just enough to power ship systems and the Duron.

“Gene, how quickly can you make it to the bridge?” the captain called back on comms.

“On the way” I called back, as I kicked hard for the hatch. That's not really the kind of question that looks for an
answer; it's more of a request. I know Dak well enough to know he doesn't really care how long it would take; he wants me there immediately-if-not-sooner, with bells on.

“You have 120 seconds, mister.”

“Aye Captain”, I replied. As I boosted across the cargo bay, the assemblers below me were both welding away and working like... well, like machines. The framework looked to be completed, and it looked like they were working on the structure for the interior compartments. I wish I had more time to watch, it was really something to behold, intelligent machines building machines – but I had to move.

The inner lock forward cycled me through, and I was boosting across the gun deck as Shorty hooked down out of her station and joined me for a flight forward.

“Hey Gene”, she said smiling. “Do you know what the Captain needs?”

“No idea Shorty, he said hop, and, well... you know what that means.”

She laughed at my scowl, and sang out the familiar cadence, “Quick and fast!”

I replied, “--like a bunny!”

“--on the double!”

“--at the ready!” I finished,
laughing at the ancient rhyme of the cadet academy as we hauled up the forward ladder to the bridge companionway.

“Race ya!” she called out, boosting off my right shoulder.

“Not so fast, ma'am” I reached out, getting a grip on her ankle and hauling myself forward. She pivoted nearly double, and reminded me quite briskly who was the reigning champion of null-g aboard the Archaea, and it wasn't Mr. Gene Mitchell. I skidded to a slow stop on my face across the deck plates as she laughed her way down the hall toward the bridge.

“Just in time folks, y
ou're going to like this.” Dak said as we pulled into the bridge to the grabbers along the helm station.

“What are we looking at Captain?”
I asked, slightly out of breath and rubbing the side of my face.

“Well, we're about to witness history, according to Janis.” he replied proudly.

“Master 2…?” Shorty asked eagerly.

“That's affirmative, Shorty”, he paused, either for dramatic effect, or
a quick pull on his coffee cup… maybe both.

“What about Master 2?” I asked. 

“Gene, Janis started this fire mission about 7 hours ago”, Shorty replied.

“That's correct. Gene, she fired turrets at Master 2.” Dak added.

“And…?” I asked, not really making the historical connection.

“And... she was firing
to hit specific systems on a moving target, over a hundred times farther away than the turrets are calibrated for… Master 2 was over a million kilometers downrange when she fired, Gene.”

“She fired seven hours ago?” I said incredulously. This was beyond unbelievable.

He laughed, and replied in a horrible imitation of a carnival huckster. “That’s right, you heard right! Step right up folks and witness history in the making – will she hit the shot, or not?”

We all groaned.

“Okay, fine, I’ll stick to my day job. Yak, put Master 2 on the main screen, maximum resolution if you please.”

“Aye Captain”, he replied
, swiping his main console to the forward holo, which lit up with an incredibly detailed, high resolution view of Master 2.

“What range are we from this target, Yak?” I asked.

“Just about 2.3 million clicks, Gene”, he replied proudly.

“Hot damn...really?” I was dumbfounded. I knew we were on a mission to get the very best gear available, but I had no idea we we
re getting anything like this. The gravimetric scan showed an incredible topology. I could literally see the seams between their deck plates.

“I know, right?
You haven’t seen anything yet, Gene. Janis has targets plotted throughout this system, even some past Neptune!”

“Hold on folks – we can drool later. Coming up on the ten-count here...” he trailed off, as we all leaned in and watched the screen intently.

Right at zero, to the dot, the salvos hit Master 2, and we watched in real time as they tore into her turrets, her torp hatches, and her comms array topside. Viciously accurate, and devastating, Janis had scored 100% on every round.

“Fire mission complete”, she said softly.

A stunned silence filled the bridge, as we all absorbed what had just happened.

“Nice shooting Janis.” the captain breathed across the still air of the bridge.

“Thank you sir
”, she replied brightly. Clearly she was very proud of this accomplishment.

“That was a damn fine shot
indeed”, Shorty added, in a tiny voice filled with awe and respect.

“You're too kind, Jane.” Janis replied sweetly.  Just for fun, I tried to play through the ballistic calculations for a shot like that, the variables, the changes in course – heck, at that
distance even the galactic rotation would have had to be accounted for. It was absolutely beyond the realm of anything I could even begin to calculate.

I looked over a
t Dak, who was smiling proudly, his head filling with ticker-tape, accolades, and headlines - as one might expect, and certainly not without merit.