Chapter 6

Delta Volantis System
Flag Bridge, GNS Moshe Dyan
15/05/41 NR 1210 Hours

“Transit detected! Designate as Bogey Four and start track!” The tactical officer’s fingers traced across his holographic displays, adding the blood red icon to the three on the flagship’s master plot.

“Right on time, too.”

Admiral Aaron Peters turned his command chair and smiled at his grim faced chief of staff. “Come now, David. We surmised that they had the reaction mass and certainly the will to chase us.” He glanced at Luisa McDaniel, but she was turned away, focused on her own displays. “How much delta vee did they bring with them, Melvin?” He turned his chair toward the tactical officer.

Curved lines arced across the representation of the Delta Volantis system as the combat information team furiously worked out the United Nations ships’ courses and speeds. “Not enough to catch us, Sir, but they’re gaining on us.”

Aaron peered at his own display and nodded. The civilian ships just weren’t fast enough, and they needed to translate the wormholes at lower velocities, or risk being torn apart by the gravitational stresses inside. The 10 Ceti wormhole was twenty hours away, and the enemy task group would make up twelve hours on them by the time the Dyan herself made transit. However, there was no way they could bring Aaron’s badly outclassed force into missile range. Yet.

David stepped close to his commander. “We can’t run much longer, Sir.”

Aaron nodded, unlocked his seat harness, and stood up. “Set up a staff meeting with all captains in the briefing room in ten minutes. Commander McDaniel, would you join us?”

“Of course, Admiral,” Luisa replied with equal formality. Aaron still chose to treat her as a visiting dignitary, and it rankled her more than it really should have. The Martian Defense Force was an informal organization with little regard for official ranks, much less the pomp and circumstance the Genevans insisted on bestowing upon her. She was sick and tired of being addressed as ‘Ma’am’ and ‘Commander’.

She stood, her movements stiff because of her injuries, and followed Aaron through the briefing room hatch, stepping carefully in the one gee gravity field the Dyan produced as it raced across the Delta Volantis System ahead of its executioners.

Dyan’s briefing room was a small compartment just off the flag bridge, wedged between the admiral’s quarters and the combat information center, buried at the heart of the frigate’s armored crew section. There were too many attendees to hold full sized holograms, so the projector scaled down each of Aaron’s captains and their execs so that the meeting looked like a kindergarten class. He would have smiled but for the gravity of the situation they faced. His own flag captain, Albrecht Hannover, and his exec, Sondra Blevins, were physically present, as was David Matthews and Luisa McDaniel.

“Let’s get started, ladies and gentlemen,” Aaron announced without preamble. “As you can see for yourselves, we are in a serious situation. The enemy has chosen to send four cruisers, plus eight escorts, against us. The rest of our warships are waiting for us just on the other side of the 10 Ceti wormhole. They will bring us to our full strength; ten frigates and twenty-four scouts. Our problem, in the simplest terms, is that we cannot hide, and we are only one more transit from the end of the line.”

Aaron touched a control on the holographic panel before him, and a three dimensional map sprang to life over the table. The same information was being relayed to every ship in his task force. The 10 Ceti System glowed at the center, a yellow G8 star with a half dozen planets and no fewer than four wormhole termini. Cobalt blue lines depicted the wormholes’ paths, linking them to the other systems. This map bore no resemblance to the stars’ actual locations in the galaxy; their connections to one another were what mattered.

Delta Volantis lay closest to the head of the table, and it contained both the golden icon of their own task force and the scarlet sigil of the enemy force. To the left lay Beta Mensae; the Theta Coronae Australis System was toward the table’s foot, and 28 Librae was to Aaron’s right. The blue lines ended at each of these systems, for that was the extent of the network. Six systems, and there was no other place to run.

“We’ve sent orders that the navigation databases in Xi Pegasi and Delta Volantis be destroyed, but there’s no guarantee that it’s been done. So, we must assume that the UN has our astrogation data. 10 Ceti is the crossroads, and we need to buy our transports time to transit to the other systems.”

“Therefore,” Aaron enlarged the 10 Ceti System in the display, “I want to hit them hard when they transit after us. I propose that we slow down enough to kill our accel after we transit, and wait for them with our entire force. They’ve been transiting one at a time, and I expect that they won’t risk a simultaneous transit with their cruisers. We hammer them one at a time, and we hurt them before they can lock onto us.”

Hannover raised his hand, and Aaron nodded to his flag captain. “Admiral, may I point out that we intend to use a variant of the defense First Squadron mounted in Xi Pegasi?” Aaron nodded, and he continued. “The difference is that Commodore Legrere didn’t know what she faced. The Admiral has sent messages to the ships at 10 Ceti to deploy all available missiles at the wormhole. We will hit the cruisers with literally everything we have as they transit. Any questions?”

No one responded, and Aaron smiled grimly. “I plan to detach one scout to escort each of our six transports, and we will split them evenly between the remaining systems. At least it will take them some time to root us out.” He fell silent and regarded each of his subordinates in turn as they came to grips with the situation. “We are going to stomp the guts out of them, ladies and gentlemen. Commander McDaniel has provided us detailed schematics of the Europe class cruiser, and we have examined the remains of one up close. We know its strengths and its weaknesses.”

He looked to his control panel, and the star map vanished, to be replaced by a schematic of a Europe class cruiser. “Now, they use the same basic systems we do; liquid coolant and radiators, fusion reactors, and deutritium fusion engines. Their lasers aren’t quite as good, but their missiles are much larger, with more fuel and heavier warheads. These schematics have been downloaded to your targeting systems, but I want to point out the weaknesses we’ve identified.”