Chapter 636

Ship’s Training Mission for the Miadax Crew

The Hunter, Impulse Engines Down, Snuggled to An Asteroid in the Oort Cloud Some 7000 AUs Outside the Ticichi System.

... The lights went out, and the red emergency lighting activated throughout the ship. The First Officer had already instructed the AI to maintain power to the frigate’s weaponry and the Bridge’s sensors. He wasn’t worried about sounds in space — there were none — but he was worried that the onboard electronics and sensors would be detectable.

“Sir, the unknown ship has gone to active scanning.”

“Steady as she goes, Helm. Continue to maintain your position on the opposite side of the asteroid from the unknown vessel, but continue to use as little thrust as you can manage while doing it, and make the thruster pulses as random as possible.”

“Maintain opposite side of the asteroid. Minimal thrust and random pulses,” Helm responded, his voice all business and devoid of emotion.

The Navigator dropped something with a clatter, and everyone jumped before looking sheepish — all except the First Officer and the Captain that is — both of whom did not flinch or react.

“Well done, Helm,” First complimented a few moments later as the Helmsman kept their ship directly opposite the mystery ship as it passed by, now only three and a half light seconds away. “They are obviously scanning the asteroid, but their course has not altered. Their scanner operators may just be bored and curious, so they decided to check out the largest boulder around.”

“Sir?” Science said. “According to my database, that is a Dhisoi ship, Elois Class, equivalent to our Fulton Class destroyer. She is seventy-five meters longer than our frigate, has the latest armor and an extra thickness of it if the database is correct. Also, she has six more weapon arrays than we do. Sir, no wonder none of the Alliance ships could stand against the pirates.”

The First sat thinking. We have six message torps capable of warp. They are absurdly expensive, but we need to let Command know what has happened and what we are up against so they can send enough firepower the next time. The First Officer suddenly realized that he had a negative attitude. Shit, I have already lost the battle in my mind, and I am not even positive this is a pirate ship, but for damn sure, it is a warship. Then again, if it is not a pirate, then why in the hell is a Dhisoi ship out here a quarter of the way across the galaxy from its home system?

Dammit, I will go down as the officer who lost his ship on his first attempt at command, but even as the thought crossed his mind, he could think of exceptions. Still, why could it not be on my tenth command or my twentieth or my fucking one hundredth? No one will remember that I was outgunned against a ship that has more armor. What will be remembered is it was my first mission where I was in total charge. Fuck that, he stormed to himself. We may lose, but the pirates will fucking know they have been in a battle.

Before I can attack, I must know for certain that this is one of the pirate vessels. Logic would dictate that it is, but I do not have proof. Absurd as it may be, there might be a legitimate reason for that warship to be out here. Even as the thought crossed his mind, some part of his brain was laughing at the absurdity of it. I need more information. I need to know its destination. Even if we lose the battle — he almost laughed aloud at that thought since the other ship had far thicker armor than the Hunter and more weaponry — we need to communicate all the information to Command so they can put a stop to the pirating and avenge us. Shit, I need to include the crew’s last messages in the torp for we are Federation. We do not back down. I will make damn sure that these pirates will not go away unscathed.

The unknown ship continued on its way as the First Officer looked around at the drawn faces of his Bridge Crew. “It is getting stuffy and a little cool in here. AI, resume normal internal operations.”

“Resuming normal internal operations,” it repeated as the air began circulating again and the internal temperature soon returned to normal.

“Science, Navigation, each of you plot the pirate ship’s course as accurately as you can from the information we have received.”

The pirate ship had passed by at approximately three and a half light seconds distance and roughly parallel to the movement of the asteroid cluster.

“Plot the other ship’s course as accurately as we can,” Navigation said, followed an instant later by Science repeating the same thing.

“I need that fucking impulse drive,” the First muttered to himself.

Although the Engine Room could not hear what was said on the Bridge, many of the Bridge’s instruments were repeated on the Engine Room’s monitors.

A few minutes later:

“First Officer from Engineering,” the Chief said, sounding official.

“Go, Chief Engineer.”

“She is back together, and my instruments say she’s one hundred percent, but ... we know what the impulse engines have been through, so count on ninety percent and hope for the rest. Do not push her past her stated maximum unless you want to try walking. Engineering, out.”

The First Officer acknowledged the Chief. “Helm, back away from the asteroid. Go to one-quarter impulse and intersect the pirate’s path as they passed by.”

Helm responded, “Intersect the pirate’s path at one-quarter impulse. Sir.”

Science spoke up. “Sir, the pirate ship is already out of detection range using passive scanning only.”

The First Officer kept his eyes glued to his screens and refused to look toward his Captain. “Very well. Navigation, Science, each of you compute your best estimate of the pirate’s course and send it to Helm.”

When they had repeated the command, he again addressed Helm. “Assume the midpoint of the two computed courses and proceed at one-quarter impulse.”

“Midpoint of the two courses and proceed at one-quarter Impulse, Sir,” Helm repeated, the stress clear in his voice.

“We cannot use active scanning, or they will know we are following, and we want to follow them with the smallest possible chance of their detecting us.”

The Captain looked over at his First Officer only a meter away and quietly said, “Why did you not just pick Navigation’s estimated course? Navigation is his job, and he is damn good at it.”

“We could not bounce a pulse off their ship to get an accurate distance or a precise angle on their course as they passed by. But Science has different equipment, and we both know that it is going to be difficult to estimate their exact course as far away as the pirates are by now. Chances of us successfully following them after the wait while only using passive sensors are slim to none, so I took a little different shot at it. Besides, you know they both did their very best to estimate the course, and you can bet they checked their math multiple times.”

The Captain shrugged and barely hid a grin.

As their ship eased along at one-quarter impulse, the First worried. Why is that ship out here in the middle of nowhere? The only logical reason would be that it is going to the pirate’s headquarters. The question is whether their headquarters is on this side of the wormhole or the other. Wherever it is, if I go in there right on their tail, they will still have their vessel fully crewed. Why not give them a chance to relax? Of course, if I wait and their headquarters is on the other side of the wormhole, they might be out of detection range. Still, I am not going to follow too closely or I will be detected.

The First sat quietly for long minutes. Shit, the crew has a right to know what I intend, and there is a simple way to do it.

“Captain?” the First asked, his voice serious.

“Your ship, First,” the Captain said, his voice quiet and just as serious.

Shit. He knows what I was going to ask, and he still will not comment.

“AI, Ship Wide.” After the blare of the Attention siren. “Attention, all hands. We are following a Dhisoi ship, Elois Class. If you are not familiar with the class, I suggest you look it up. At this point, I do not have absolute proof that she is a pirate ship, but logic dictates she is. Hopefully, we will be able to follow her to the pirate’s headquarters. I suggest that everyone update your LM (last message). If we go into combat with her, I will drop a message torp home. That is all.”

Ten minutes later, the impulse drive still seemed to be operating flawlessly. “Okay, Helm. Kick it up to one-half Impulse. I do not think we can catch them, but maybe we will be successful in following them. Any information we gain will be more than we have now, but it makes little sense for them to be out here — particularly with only impulse power. They could move a few light seconds away from the asteroids and go back to warp, but they have not. There are no planets, dwarf planets, or even large asteroids out here for them to use as a base, so why are they crawling along on impulse?”

A few minutes later, Science suddenly tensed at his console. “First! My instruments have detected a truly tremendous energy spike.”

“The pirates’ ship just blew, I hope,” the First returned, half-serious.

“Uh, no, Sir. Uh, my sensors are telling me it is ... Sir, crazy as it may sound, from what my sensors are reporting, it would have to be a wormhole.”

“But every wormhole in several thousand light-years has been cataloged — not that there are that many of them — and none have been found in this entire sector — hence our sixty-two-day trip under warp drive.”

“Affirmative, Sir, but my sensors say the energy surge was a wormhole activating.”

“Mine also confirm,” Helm added.

First and the Captain had already checked their sensors by then. When the First glanced at the Captain, he nodded.

“Damn,” the First muttered under his breath.

“Helm, compare your present course to the direction the sensors say the wormhole is located.”

“Sir, they are not identical, but our plotted course should pass very near the location of the energy discharge. The wormhole must be the pirate ship’s destination.”

“Initiate course to coordinates of the wormhole and proceed at one-quarter impulse.”

“Course to wormhole laid in at one-quarter impulse, and I am initiating,” Helm responded.

“Weapons Officer, bring all weapons systems on line and stand by. Should we engage the destroyer in combat, do not use the six DELTAs on the backup array until I give the order.”

“All weapon systems on line. Do not use the six DELTAs in the backup array unless ordered, Sir.”

The First Officer risked a glance at his Captain to see him hyper-alert, but although their eyes locked for a moment, the Captain did not comment.

“Weapons, if this is a wormhole the pirates have commandeered, they will have security and probably lots of it, but wait for my order.”

“Awaiting your order, Sir.”

“Communications, stand ready to issue Standard Warning on my order.”

“Wait for your order to initiate standard warning,” Sir.

A tense few minutes later and the First Officer spoke again. “Helm, reduce to one-eighth impulse.”

“Reducing to one-eighth impulse, Sir.”

A moment later and using his com, the First Officer contacted the Chief Engineer. “I have spoken with our repair section. If you will give them the specifications for the missile spikes, they will use their equipment to produce them for you. They tell me it should take only a few minutes with equipment designed to manipulate armor. Also, if a missile tech or two would be of help to you, I can send a couple until we engage the pirates.”

There was a hesitation while the Chief took in what the First had said. “So, you are going to try my missiles?”

“I would be a fool not to, and I certainly want more than six of them before we engage that destroyer.”

“As I mentioned, I have six more DELTAs waiting for spikes. With the assistance of a couple of the missile technicians, I can have the missiles ready in a few minutes — once — I have the spikes.”

“Send your dimensions to the repair supervisor. He said it would be trivial to produce the spikes.”

“Well, it certainly was not trivial to reconfigure the spikes with my jerry-rigged presser fields,” the Chief groused. After a slight hesitation, “I will send the dimensions for the spikes and my appreciation.”