Fury to the Stars (Universe in Flames Book 2) (11 page)

“Yeah, that was my thought as well,” Yanis agreed.
“However, there’s a catch.”

“I’m listening.”

“The all-power shot would temporarily disable the
ship in the process.” He paused. “For shields and life support to get back up
to twenty percent, the ship would require sixty seconds, another minute or so
for full main power to the weapons and sub-light engines, and at least five
minutes to get all systems back to full power and restore the jump engines.”

Chase frowned. “Can’t we simply use the power of the
twin engines and reserve the backup power to do all these things after the
shot?”

“You can, and that’s how it is set by default. But
it will lessen your power shot by roughly twenty-five percent. Plus, you’d
still need a minute or two before you could fire again while the gun’s plasma
chambers recharge. But in the meantime, shields, laser turrets, and torpedoes
would still be at your disposal.”

“Then I don’t see a problem,” Chase said
confidently. “I suppose two or three of these shots would still disable the
Zarlack capital ship’s shield.”

Yanis considered. “Probably. It depends how fast
they would recharge in between shots. But the point I’m trying to make here is
that the Heracles cannon also has that gamble type of firing that would you
require to go ‘all-in,’ as the humans say. So while this is very risky, it’s
still an option. I know it’s the kind of edge you might want to use in one of
those over-the-top, bat-shit crazy ideas you seem to concoct under pressure. No
offense.”

Chase grinned. “None taken, and duly deserved. I’m
glad that something like this can be done. It might even save our asses one
day.”

“My thoughts exactly.” Yanis looked up sharply. “But
don’t jinx us.”

“What is it called?” Sarah asked.

“EAD
Hope
,” Yanis replied, literally beaming
with pride.

Chase frowned in confusion. “EAD?”

“We renamed the Alliance, if you remember.”

Yanis went on to explain that since the ship had,
for all intents and purposes, almost double the power of even bigger class
destroyers in the fleet, it would make a perfect ship to churn out in large
numbers fast. It was clearly a war machine first and foremost, but its added
speed in hyperspace as well as superior sub-light speed made it also a great
exploration ship.

“Why would we build anything but these, then?” asked
Chase.

“Well, we still require larger ship as carriers.
This can only accommodate two squadrons of fighters and lacks the tube-canon
ejection system. So you can’t deploy a squadron as fast as on the
Destiny
,
for example.”

“Yeah, two squadrons if the ship is alone can be a
little tight.”

“That’s where the F-147 StarCrusher comes in.”

“The what now?” Sarah asked, a twinkle in her
beautiful green eyes.

“Yeah, the what?” echoed Chase.

“Shush, he’s talking fighters,” she said with a
smile.

This time, the whole table cracked a laugh. Then
Yanis got up and pressed something on his wrist device. The hologram
immediately changed to display what looked awfully like an F-140 Thunderbolt.

“Ladies and gentlemen, let me present you the new
and improved version of my already very popular space-worthy fighter bomber.”
When he received nothing but blank stares, Yanis’ face fell. “I… I expected
some applause.”

“F-147 StarCrusher?” Chase asked. “
StarCrusher?
Really? That’s what you’re naming it? And why F-147 and not F-141?”

“Finally some reaction! Not the kind I expected,
but, well,” said Yanis, scratching his head. “And yes, I think it’s a cool
name. If you don’t like it, bite me! As for the number, I like the number seven
and I added at least seven new technologies to the craft. So there, a little
creative freedom if you please?”

“Easy, tiger,” Sarah soothed, trying to diffuse the
testosterone-infused hiccup. “StarCrusher isn’t that bad, and if worse comes to
worse, we can rename it later. What really interests me is what it can do.”

“Right.” Yanis pouted. “We can rename it later...
or
not
.”

“Yanis,” interjected Chase.

“Okay, okay… It can do a lot, in fact. As you well
know, despite its glowing reputation, the F-140 was a bit of a rush job. We
were under imminent threat; we had to do the modifications fast and we really
went super raw on the types of systems we were able to include.”

“If you ask me, it’s one hell of a ship, raw or
not,” Sarah offered.

“Well, thank you.” Yanis glowed. “And I agree. Not
only that, but analyzing the logs and stats from the last battle seemed to
confirm that as well. The Thunderbolt outperformed and out-killed the
Manticore-class fighters. Granted, both of the best pilots were using them so
that could affect the overall stats, but in the end it became clear that it is
a very efficient ship. So I’ve been working on this ever since the first F-140
got built. With the arrival of the Omega fighters, I was tempted to just drop
it and try duplicating Admiral Thassos’ new toys, but I had invested so much in
it already, it seemed a shame. So I thought the F-140 deserved a much leaner,
streamlined and technology-infused upgrade. My thinking was to try and make a
bridge between the F-140 and the Omegas. That way, I could bring the best of
both worlds into a new ship. Hence, the F-147.”

Chase gazed at the holo-image. “I have to admit, I
love the way the F-140 looked, so I’m glad you used the same design, just with
a darker paint job.”

“So do I,” Yanis agreed. “But while on the outside
not much seems to have changed, under the hood is a whole different story.
First, it’s twenty percent heavier and bigger. Of course, on the hologram you
can’t really tell, but that allowed me to find the space I needed to load it
with every gadget and system I could think of, and to reinforce the plating now
that quadrinium is no longer an issue.”

Yanis clapped his hands brusquely.

“Now to the good stuff, shall we? Since it’s bigger,
I managed to put redundancies and self-repairing systems pretty much on
anything critical, but that’s not all. I loved the fact that the original F-14
Tomcat has twin engines, so I replicated that design with our latest generation
engines. A higher-yield, secondary power reserve doubled the number of laser
cannons, and it can now carry an additional twin torpedo complement or four
missiles, depending on your ordnance choice.”

Sarah clapped her hands in applause.

“Why, thank you,” said Yanis, turning to Chase and
adding casually, “See, that’s not so difficult.”

“Show off!” snorted Chase.

“Look who’s talking,” both Yanis and Sarah said in
unison, laughing right after.

Chase nodded reasonably. “Touché.”

“But that’s not all. Of course, every F-147 will
come with those neuronal link interfaces you guys are so crazy about. Again,
the logs showed it’s more efficient than the traditional stick, push, and
physical HUD. Earth pilots actually seem to adapt faster to it than our own,
for some reason, but still, after sufficient training, everyone seems to get
used to it and there are gains in efficiency as well.”

He got suddenly to his feet.

“But now for the grand finale.” He rubbed his palms
together.

“Oh, for the love of—”

“Ah-ta-ta-ta... This one requires special mention,”
Yanis insisted.

“You should have started with ‘one more thing’
then,” said Sarah casually.

Both Yanis and Chase looked at each other, and,
after a while, when it became clear they both didn’t get the reference—after
all how could they?—Sarah added, “It’s a Steve Jobs thing. He was the CEO of
Apple until he passed away. God rest his soul. And when he was still alive he
would keep a special reveal at the end of his speeches, and would say ‘one more
thing’ and everyone in the audience knew something special was about to
happen.”

“I’ve heard a lot about Apple. That nice,
chain-smoking tech Cedric mentioned it took a little more time to hack their
computers compared to something called ‘Windows’ when he had to teleport the
EMP to the behemoth Zarlack ship.”

“Apple? Windows? Who thinks up these names? In
comparison, your StarCrusher is a stroke of genius,” said Chase.

They all laughed for a good while, then Sarah added,
“True. When I stop to think about it, the naming of Apple as a company is a
weird choice, but then it worked. It became the most successful tech company
until… well, until you guys showed up, basically. I wonder what happened to
them or their products, in fact.”

“I know what happened,” said Yanis. “Some of their
best engineers are working with me on the F-147 and the other pet projects I
have. Some of them were sent to other R&D stations, and Earth still
produces smartphones and tablets, but a single model of each, infused with some
of our technology; mostly so the damn things don’t die for lack of power after
a single day’s use. And of course with higher processing power now as well, we’ve
upgraded them to quantum computing. They’re now fully awesome.”

“Steve Jobs would be proud of you, at least for the
upgrades. Not sure he would have liked the fact that all this is made without
profit for the company.”

“Right. Still, what matters is that we adapted
something that was well done originally on your world and made it just more
efficient, ecologic and available to anyone who needs to use it.”

Chase scratched his neck.

“We’re getting off track. What about you tell us
what other changes you made to the StarCrusher?” said Chase, clearly impatient
to know what more it could do.

 “Right, back to it. The next thing was
actually inspired by you. You remember when you told me to look at a way to
increase efficiency to the remote control of a squadron?”

“Absolutely,” Chase recalled. “I loved having the
option to fly remotely. Of course, it’s not quite as efficient as just flying
my own ship, and, to be honest, sometimes it feels a bit like sacrificing a
huge number of ships, but—”

“Exactly! Why would we lose
entire
ships when
we could lose much smaller ones?”

The question lay in the air between them.

“You want to build smaller ships?” Chase frowned.

“Drones!” Sarah cried, as if she’d won a game show.

Yanis beamed at her. “Exactly! I’ve looked at the concept
of drones in human warfare; it was all the rage before our arrival. And I can
see why. They allow soldiers to do tactical missions without incurring loss of
life.”

“Sounds good to me,” Chase said with a twinkle in
his eyes.

“I’ve loaded them onboard the F-147s. Each craft has
four drones, all pre-programmed with your sub-routines as well as a full auto
mode, and so the onboard computer can pilot them based on the data we’ve
gathered from the logs and statistics we’ve recorded during your engagement.
We’ve also taken into account analysis of Zarlack attack patterns and baked
that in. For you, I’m sure you’ll prefer the manual mode, in which case you now
will have access to them and your commands via the neuronal link; but for less
experienced fighters, the drones will auto pilot themselves based on your
sub-routines, still adding firepower and efficiency to dogfights.”

“That sounds really good, but how tough are they? I
doubt they are as solid as fighters.”

Yanis nodded. “You’re right, how could they be? But
I’ve used the same power source I used in the shielded torpedoes, so they’re
tough little suckers. They’re shielded, with a small yet rechargeable secondary
power reserve like full-size craft. They fire single laser canons but are
modular in frequency and power distribution. And finally, they can be either
remote detonated as mines or used as shielded torpedoes if required.”

Chase studied Yanis critically. “You haven’t slept
since the last attack, have you?”

“Not so much,” Yanis admitted. “After what happened
on Earth, I wanted us ready for whatever Obsidian and the Zarlacks had to throw
at us. These bastards need to know we won’t let them walk all over us.”

He sat back in his chair with a satisfied sigh. The
presentation was apparently over and he’d done his job well. He was shocked,
however, when Chase leapt up from his seat and gave him an unexpected hug.

“What’s that for?” Yanis stammered, a little
stunned.

Chase flushed self-consciously. “It’s something I
picked up from the humans. It’s what you do… you know… when you’re grateful to
someone.”

Yanis and Sarah exchanged a knowing look and Chase
was quick to change the subject.

“Wait—what about cloaking?”

“Snap! I knew I forgot something,” admitted Yanis.
“Perhaps you’re right, I do need to sleep and relax a little.”

“Can it be installed? It would be a tremendous
advantage tactically, and I take it with your access to the Omegas, you must
have the means to install that tech as well, right?”

“As a matter of fact it already is. I just forgot to
tell you about it. And… there’s a catch. The F-147 emits a much stronger power
signature than the Alliance starfighters, and is considerably larger too. So
there are some limitations...”