10:30 (Universal Time)
Sunday, January 10, 2332
Bridge of the A.M.S. NOSTROMO
Pulling away from the orbit of Providence
Alpha Centauri B System
Tina had a last sad look at the New Horizon orbital station as her NOSTROMO started flying away from it: her two children and her husband had been left behind on the station, like all the other children, relatives and commercial associates which had been deemed non-combatants. The mission she was now starting was simply too dangerous and she and her crew would need to concentrate solely on it. Whatever would happen in the TOI 1231 System, at least little Janet and Misha would be safe, escorted by their father. Normally, Michel would have been definitely considered as a combatant crew member but, as in the cases involving families with both parents being regular crewmembers, one of the parents had to stay behind and stay with the children. Once at a safe distance from the orbital station, Tina looked at her principal pilot, Frida Skarsgard.
‘’You can start accelerating away on main drive, Frida. Dana, get ready to jump on our precalculated destination.’’
‘’Ready on my station, Tina!’’
Satisfied, Tina then spoke on the radio frequency of the orbital traffic control center.
‘’New Horizon Traffic Control, this is the NOSTROMO. Do you have us on radar?’’
Somehow, the usually prompt to react traffic controller took a few seconds to reply to her.
‘’Er, NOSTROMO, have you pulled away from the station yet? I don’t see you on radar.’’
That response made Tina grin with satisfaction: the new mate black radar and infra-red absorbing coat of paint applied to her ship, along with the newly added electronic counter-measure pods attached to her ship’s hull, was doing its work. Furthermore, the mate black paint would also make the NOSTROMO very difficult to visually detect against the black backdrop of deep Space.
‘’That’s the way I want it, New Horizon Control. NOSTROMO out!’’
‘’Course set and jump calculated, Tina.’’ said Dana Durning from her navigator’s station. ‘’Jumping in ten seconds. Three…two…one, jumping now!’’
A brief flash of orange light permeated the bridge sphere, signaling an interstellar jump via their Koomak Drive. The view on the holographic inner screens of the bridge sphere then changed completely. From having the orange ball of Alpha Centauri B and the blue ball of the planet Providence visible, the screens now showed the black of deep space, plus a distant, faint red ball behind them.
‘’Confirm position, please!’’
‘’We are at the precalculated point, nine AUs behind the TOI 1231 primary, Tina. We can now reverse course and head towards that red dwarf star.’’
‘’Frida, reverse course and adjust our trajectory towards TOI 1231 b. Accelerate to 0.002 c{5}, then continue on coasting. We will now stick to the three ‘S’ until further notice.’’
‘’The three ‘S’, Tina?’’
‘’Yes! Slow, steady and stealthy.’’ answered Tina, smiling, before switching on her ship-wide intercom. ‘’Attention, all hands! We are now inside the TOI 1231 System but will be proceeding slowly and cautiously for the next twenty hours or so. Secure from battle stations and return to routine operations but be ready to react quickly to any warning. Catch as much sleep as you can and eat something while things are calm. That is all!’’
Next, she looked at her bridge crew and passed her directives.
‘’The regular day shift will stay on. The rest of you: go rest! Dana, go rest as well, so that you can relieve me in six hours from now.’’
‘’Understood, Tina!’’ replied the buxom navigator and unofficial first officer before getting up from her station and leaving the bridge with two-thirds of the other crewmembers.
Tina had time to complete her day shift, go rest for six hours and then return to the bridge before something showed up on the ship’s passive sensors as the NOSTROMO was about to pass through the asteroid belt of the system.
‘’Tina, we are now detecting a weak radar signal from our eleven o’clock. It is coming from inside the asteroid belt.’’
Tina immediately tensed up on hearing that from Minh Wa Hien, one of the bridge sensors operators.
‘’Is it a search or surveillance radar, Hien?’’
‘’The frequency is too high for that, Tina. My guess would be some kind of navigation radar, and not a very powerful one. Also, its angular movement is barely discernable: either it is moving in the same direction as us or it is moving quite slowly.’’
‘’Hum, doesn’t sound like a warship on patrol. Aim our main telescope on that radar source and see if we can identify it visually.’’
‘’On it, Tina!’’
Less than a minute later, Hien spoke up again.
‘’I have a moving object in sight, Tina. It actually looks like a closely coupled pair of large objects. One, while big enough, is dwarfed by the other object. Both are of irregular shape and appear to be glued to each other, with the smaller one ahead of the bigger one.’’
Tina thought for a moment, puzzled, before she had a revelation.
‘’A tugboat towing an asteroid! That’s the only thing that would make sense in this case.’’
‘’That may well be it, Tina. What do we do about it?’’
‘’In what direction are they heading?’’
‘’They are roughly on course towards TOI 1231 b, Tina.’’
‘’Then, this may be a Predator tugboat towing an asteroid towards the planet. Try to read their body composition with our spectrometers.’’
‘’I read surfaces made of nickel-iron, typical of M-Class asteroids.’’
‘’The kind of asteroids the Predators use to turn into ships. This is definitely smelling like a tugboat bringing a fresh asteroid inside the system, so that it could be transformed into a ship. With the huge losses the Predators have suffered at the hands of our battle fleet, they must be eager to replace their losses with new ships. Frida, approach that pair from the rear while being careful to stay in the radar shadow of the towed asteroid. Then, you will be able to practice your tailgating driving from very close behind the bigger asteroid.’’
‘’And what told you that I like tailgating other vehicles, Tina?’’
‘’Your piloting!’’ replied Tina jokingly, making many on the bridge laugh briefly or snicker.
‘’Alright, Tina: I will get close enough to read its license plate.’’
Frida Skarsgard then made the NOSTROMO make a wide, very progressive turn towards the port side until it was trailing the moving asteroids from afar, then slowly approached them. Soon, the main telescope, a powerful optical astronomical instrument, started showing more details about the moving asteroids.
‘’The trailing asteroid appears to be a raw one, Tina, but it is also quite big. It measures a good 3.6 kilometers in diameter and is at least eight kilometers-long. As for the leading asteroid, it is presently completely hidden by the mass of the bigger asteroid.’’
‘’Good! It will thus be impossible for the radar of this tugboat to detect us in our present position. Minh, deploy two stealth probes but leave them close to us, with just enough separation for them to be able to look ahead past this big asteroid. We will use those probes for our forward vision.’’
‘’Aye, Tina!’’
‘’Electronic warfare, are you intercepting any signal other than that of the tugboat’s radar?’’
‘’We do hear a number of weak radio signals coming from the planet and moon ahead, Tina. They do not appear to be encrypted, so are probably routine communications links.’’
‘’Spirit, can you understand the Predators’ language yet?’’
‘’My translation base on Predator Language is still only at 26%, Tina, but I am working on improving it. I will keep you appraised if I make marked improvements to that.’’
‘’Thanks, Spirit! Reena, how long will it take us at our present speed and that of this tugboat to arrive close to that planet ahead?’’
‘’About another eighteen hours, Tina. That tugboat is not that powerful and the asteroid it is pulling is truly massive.’’
‘’Eighteen hours?! Talk about a slow trip to Hell! Alright, the pilot, sensors and electronic warfare stations will start relief rotations every two hours, starting in one hour, so that we always have fresh and rested operators on duty at those stations. The other stations will now go at half-manning. If this tugboat and its load could hide us all the way to TOI 1231 bc, then I will be as happy as a pig in shit.’’
‘’Oink oink!’’ then said Patricia O’Neil, making everybody on the bridge laugh.
15:10 (New Dawn Time)
Navy Headquarters, New Dawn
Providence, Alpha Centauri B System
Spirit, sitting in the office previously used by Admiral Fenton as head of the Navy, was conversing via video link with Janet Robeson, who was in the Minister of Defense’s office some two floors up, when someone knocked on her door. Then, before she could excuse herself with Janet and invite in whoever was at the door, two senior officers, one a commodore and another a rear admiral, entered and walked to her desk, stopping close to it. With her video link with Janet Robeson still active and with her screen facing her and not being visible to her two pushy visitors, Spirit stared coldly at the two flag officers.
‘’Gentlemen, I do not believe that I invited you in. Your manners are quite cavalier, I must say.’’
‘’You find our manners cavalier?’’ replied the rear admiral. ‘’What about the way you totally rewrote our proposed plan to replace our ship losses?’’
‘’Rear Admiral Papadopoulos, I rewrote your plan because it was both deeply flawed and ignored the reality concerning the Space Predators. Your proposal to continue building at an accelerated pace more ships of the present COSMONAUT-Class was a recipe for a waste of our limited shipbuilding resources. We need to design a new, better class of battlecruiser that could hold its own against a Predator asteroid warship and win. The recent battle in the TOI 1231 System should have been enough of a demonstration about the shortcomings of the COSMONAUT-Class battlecruisers. It also highlighted some glaring shortcomings in the tactical training of our cruiser commanders and of our flag officers.’’
‘’And who the hell are you to say that? You are not a Navy officer! Hell, you are not even a Human!’’
Her expression now severe, Spirit slowly rose to her feet and stared straight into the eyes of the rear admiral.
‘’I will tell you who I am, Rear Admiral Papadopoulos! I am the avatar of a ship’s central AI computer with thousands of times the mental processing capacity of you and of all your staff combined. I, as the central computer of the KOSTROMA and then of the NOSTROMO, assisted Captain Forster in dozens of Space battles since 2315, often directing myself both weapons firing and ship maneuvering during those battles. I also proposed many times to Captain Forster tactical solutions to an oncoming fight, proposals that she accepted and applied nearly every time. I helped direct the actions of the KOSTROMA, then of the NOSTROMO, in three battles against Predator ships and we won all three of those battles. I know how to defeat Predator ships and also know what kind of ships we need to beat them and I firmly believe that your original rebuilding plan was a road to nowhere but to pure waste of time and resources. As for your criticism of me as not being a navy officer and not being human, I consider it totally irrelevant. I also consider your own service record to be less than impressive when it comes to justifying your criticizing of my judgment. For one thing, you never fought a single Space battle, in any rank or capacity, so your own experience of combat is exactly zero, Rear Admiral Papadopoulos. Our ship rebuilding plan will thus stay as I rewrote it.’’
‘’Then, expect the headquarters staff to block that plan of yours, miss. We will make sure of that. You are simply not qualified to overturn our advice.’’
From hard, Spirit’s expression then became downright menacing and she spoke with as cold a voice as she could.
‘’You know what that means in terms of military justice, Rear Admiral Papadopoulos? It is called insubordination. When you threaten to lead the rest of your staff against me, then it becomes incitation to mutiny in a time of war. You want me to remind you of the punishment for such an offense? But don’t worry about ending in front of a firing squad. I will only relieve you and the toady following you of your respective command positions. I will personally direct from now on the work of our shipbuilding program office in your place, until I can find a more competent senior officer to lead it. Now, either you leave my office now and go clean your respective desks, or I will have you arrested for insubordination and attempted incitation to mutiny. Is that clear?’’
While shaken by her firm response, Papadopoulos still made a last attempt at defiance.
‘’Nobody will believe you, you damn robot! It will be my word against yours.’’
While still staring at Papadopoulos, Spirit pivoted around her computer, letting the two officers see the stern face of Janet Robeson on its screen.
‘’The Minister of Defense and the Chairman of the High Council will believe me. You just went one step too far, Admiral.’’
‘’I agree, Spirit.’’ said Janet Robeson on the screen. ‘’Rear Admiral Papadopoulos, Commodore Holsinger, you are both under arrest for gross insubordination and incitation to mutiny. Know that I have just recorded what you said to Spirit. A military police squad will soon arrive to pick you up. Leave Spirit’s office now and wait in the hallway outside for the arrival of our MPs.’’
‘’So?’’ said Spirit when both flag officers hesitated and didn’t move. ‘’Shall I personally throw you out of my office? I can guarantee you that I am strong enough to easily do that.’’
That finally decided the two men to move and leave her office, leaving Spirit alone to speak to Janet via her computer video link.
‘’Janet, I believe that we will need to do some serious cleanup within the Navy’s command structure. If those two were typical of what I will have to work with, then we are in big trouble.’’
‘’I am afraid that you are right about that, Spirit. I will have to speak with Karl Langemann about this. I will now close this link, so that I could order a MP squad down to your office.’’
With the link now cut, Spirit reflected mentally about all the possible failings of the human ego, especially in men holding positions of power.
04:52 (Universal Time)
Monday, January 11, 2332
Bridge of the A.M.S. NOSTROMO
Approaching TOI 1231 bc and still behind the towed Predator asteroid
Tina shook her head in disbelief as she looked at the image of the moon that was the homeworld of the Space Predators, now close enough to distinguish its surface features in detail.
‘’I just can’t believe that we have been able to get within 350,000 kilometers from TOI 1231 bc without being detected still. Our battle fleet must have hurt those monsters really bad for them to have become so lax in terms of security within their own system. Up to now, we detected the emissions from only two low frequency surveillance radars since we crossed the asteroid belt.’’
‘’Well, our fleet may have lost nine battlecruisers destroyed,’’ replied Dana Durning, ‘’plus the remaining three being so heavily damaged that they are now only good for the scrap heap, but they did manage to destroy 26 Predator asteroid ships in that battle. What those Predators won in this system was truly a Pyrrhic victory at best.’’
‘’A Pyrrhic victory that will now cost them their shirt, with us now in good position to launch a surprise strike on their homeworld. Alright, call the crew to battle stations and have our heavy fighters ready to fly out. Our first target will be that Predator warship docked with that gigantic asteroid-cum-orbital station orbiting the moon. It is presently the only enemy warship visible on this side of the moon and apparently doesn’t have its force shield switched on. Once it is destroyed, we will continue with our Plan Alpha strike.’’
‘’What about that tugboat we have been closely following during all those hours, Tina?’’
‘’If it does anything but simply flee, then it will earn a missile for its trouble. Frida, be ready to raise our ship above the top of that raw asteroid being towed, just enough to clear the frontal firing arc of our cannons. Renée, fire our main battery in a concentrated fire against the mid-section of that docked asteroid warship the moment that you will have a clear shot. You will also launch at the same time our first missile mass salvo against the cities visible on the moon, while our heavy fighters will fly out and head for their designated targets.’’
‘’Gee, it is nice to have Spirit available to help me with all that targeting work.’’ replied Renée d’Argenteuil, Tina’s weapons officer. The voice of Spirit then came over the speakers of the bridge, sounding amused.
‘’Help you, Renée? I already preregistered the targets for our first missile salvo and entered that data into our missiles’ guidance systems. What are you complaining about?’’
‘’Alright, kids: we will split your marbles between you two once this is all over.’’ said a grinning Tina. Everybody ready?’’
‘’Weapons aimed and ready to fire!’’
‘’Our fighter squadrons are signaling ‘ready to fly out’.’’
‘’Helm, ready to raise our ship over the top of that asteroid.’’
‘’Then, here we go!’’
Punching the button activating the ship-wide announcement system, Tina then nearly shouted in her microphone.
‘’To all the crew, this is your captain speaking: TORA! TORA! TORA!’’
On that classic historical signal to attack given on the intercom by Tina, Frida Skarsgard made the NOSTROMO jump up by 2,000 meters, allowing the four giant disintegrator cannons of its main battery to have a direct line of fire on the docked Predator asteroid warship.
04:58 (Universal Time)
Bridge of the Space Predator tugboat SADAKA
Towing a raw asteroid being closely followed by the NOSTROMO
Nezal-Ka was happy that her long, boring towing mission was about to end. In a short while she was going to be able to deliver her load to the ZAR-KA-LOR orbital station, where it would be transformed into a much-needed new warship. While she hadn’t been told much about the battle that had opposed the Race’s fleet to a large alien attack fleet, she had heard enough to know that this alien opponent could be very dangerous if not dealt with quickly and decisively. As a female of the Race, Nezal-Ka had enough brain and intelligence to be able to judge correctly the parameters of a problem, contrary to the typical male drones, who were only good as hunters and killers in her opinion. Nezal-Ka was not the only female to think so, far from it. In fact, the Race had traditionally reserved the thinking jobs and positions of responsibility to females, while restricting male drones to the jobs of simple workers and warriors, and this for over a millennium. As a result of selective genetic breeding over the centuries, the females of the Race had developed a markedly superior average intelligence compared to that of male drones. In return for accepting that state of affair and acting accordingly, male drones could hope to couple one day with a female, while getting first pick on the fresh meat from their kills. All in all, both sexes of the Race found this arrangement plenty satisfactory.
Nezal-Ka was about to go wake up her three other crewmembers, who were presently sleeping, so that they could assist her in the delicate docking operation to come, when four thick, bright blue beams of energy shot past her tugboat, coming from the back of the asteroid she had been towing. Those energy beams then struck the docked cruiser at mid-body with big, blinding flashes. Without its force shields to protect it, the warship’s hull was quickly holed through by the blue energy beams, which then started to vaporize the inside of the warship. Nezal-Ka needed many seconds to go over her surprise and stupor, seconds that were enough for the blue beams to go completely through the warship and then start digging through the sides of the ZAR-KA-LOR orbital station-cum-shipyard. She was finally able to go over her shock and shrieked a loud shout of alarm meant to wake up her crewmates. Next, not waiting for her mates to return to the bridge, she cut off power to the big electro-magnets which had been tying together her tugboat and the raw asteroid she had been towing, then started flying away from her load. However, unable to resist her curiosity about who was firing like this on the warship and orbital station, she moved her ship slightly to one side, enough for her rear-view sensors to be able to see what was behind the raw asteroid. The sight of the huge, black alien ship flying very close to her asteroid filled her at once with a mix of horror and fear. That mix was then replaced by remorse and guilt when she understood that her tugboat and towed asteroid had involuntarily helped that alien ship approach her homeworld undetected. Looking back towards the orbital station, she saw that the enemy energy beams had by now dug all the way through its hull crust. Then, she had to close her eyes when four huge blinding explosions struck the sides of the orbital station. When Nezal-Ka was able to look again, it was to see that there were now four huge holes, each one big enough to let in her tugboat, in the hull of the orbital station, while what she could see of the inside showed utter devastation. Her remorse and guilt then were replaced with rage towards those aliens who had tricked her and were now attacking the Race. Accelerating at maximum rate, she then made her ship perform a ‘U’-turn in order to face the alien ship and charge it. Her tugboat may have been unarmed but she still could use it as a weapon. Nezal-Ka had only a fraction of a second to mentally register the image of a small object that came at her ship before everything went out in a flash of light.
Pieter Nordlung felt excitement as his heavy fighter flew out of the NOSTROMO with 93 other heavy fighters: he was going to be able to personally help make those monstrous Predators pay for all the killings and destruction they had made. Following his squadron leader, he dove his heavy fighter towards the moon that was their primary objective, heading for the upper layers of its atmosphere. As he and his squadron comrades were diving, a series of huge anti-matter blasts smothered the moon’s surface, each blast centered on a point of light indicating a Predator city or center of activity. Pieter felt pure elation as over 300 heavy missiles, each armed with a ninety-megaton anti-matter warhead, laid death and destruction across the Space Predators’ homeworld. Normally, such a wide strike would have been described by most as ‘genocidal’ but, for Pieter, this was simply a self-defense measure, as this was clearly a ‘kill or be killed’ situation. He also knew that more was to come for the moon, as this was only the opening phase of the attack against the Predator homeworld. Right now, however, his squadron had another job to do before switching to the second phase of the moon’s bombardment.
Entering the upper layers of the atmosphere of TOI 1231 bc at a shallow angle, the eight heavy fighters of Pieter’s squadron, the HFS 22 SPACE PROWLERS, went down to an altitude of 2,000 meters while flying westward towards the night terminator of the moon. Two minutes later, Pieter heard his squadron commander speak on their squadron radio channel.
‘’Heads up, Prowlers: two big bogeys are coming around the moon towards the orbit of the enemy orbital station. Each callsign is to prepare two missiles each, with one missile per approaching target. Program final micro-jump trajectories and maximum warhead yield.’’
‘’Katarina, prepare our missiles number one and two for launch, with final micro-jumps courses and yields of ninety-megaton. Be ready to lock on two approaching asteroid ships that are rounding the moon and heading our way.’’
‘’Missiles programmed and ready, Pieter.’’ replied his weapons officer, Katarina Volkova, after a few seconds. ‘’Am now waiting for final targeting data.’’
‘’Excellent! Tom, do you have these two asteroid ships on our sensors.’’
‘’Not yet, Pieter.’’ Answered Thomas Aquino, their sensors officer.
They then received more directives from their squadron leader.
‘’All Prowler callsigns, brake to a stop over this island we are about to overfly and keep an altitude of 500 meters, so that we become difficult to track on radar: we will wait in ambush there until we can target those two approaching bogeys.’’
Pieter soon stopped his fighter in midair over the said island while keeping a respectable distance with the nearest fighter: bunching up was definitely not a good tactic when facing heavy weapons. As he and the eleven other fighter crews waited for the Predator warships to come around in orbit, his copilot, Keiko Sumotori, suddenly pushed an exclamation of surprise.
‘’Hey, I see what looks like a large group of pink-colored creatures on that island. That looks like some kind of cattle farm down there.’’
‘’Who cares?!’’ replied Katarina Volkova. ‘’We are after Predator warships, not cattle!’’
‘’Wait! Did you say ‘pink cattle’, Keiko?’’
‘’Er, yes!’’
‘’Use our telescope and tell me what that cattle looks like. Also, link your telescope to my secondary display screen.’’
While a bit mystified by his request, Keiko obeyed him and was soon sending pictures to Pieter’s display screen while describing what she was seeing.
‘’I see hundreds, maybe a few thousands of herbivores with pink fur and six legs. I am not sure from this far, but they also look a bit like the old centaurs of legend.’’
‘’Hell, these are not cattle heads: they are Kiryns, intelligent beings we recently saved from the Predators and who live in the Gliese 422 System. I have to pass this information at once.’’
‘’But, why distract ourselves with these things when we are about to engage two Predator warships?’’ objected Katarina Volkova, attracting a rather dry reply from Pieter.
‘’Those ‘things’ as you called them are sentient beings. What would you do if you saw instead hundreds of Humans corralled in a place as a reserve of fresh meat? Be assured that Admiral Forster will want to know about this. If it can reassure you, I will send that info via an encrypted datalink to the NOSTROMO.’’
Thankfully for Pieter, he had time to send a message with images attached to it well before Thomas Aquino signaled the approach of the two Predator ships, rounding the moon while in high orbit. Their squadron leader then gave a terse order on the radio.
‘’All Prowler callsigns, launch missiles now!’’
‘’Missiles on the way!’’ said nearly at once Katarina. Pieter anxiously followed visually the 24 missiles now climbing at lightning speed to the near vertical.
‘’Come on, babies! Take those damn Predators in the ass!’’
‘’The Predator ships are presently operating only their low-frequency, long-range radars.’’ said Thomas Aquino, wanting to reassure his comrades. ‘’Our missiles, coming from inside the moon’s atmosphere, will probably take them by surprise.’’
‘’I hope to hell they will!’’ said Keiko Sumotori.
Some fifty seconds after missile launch, a dense pattern of gigantic explosions in orbit illuminated the sky, with Aquino shouting in triumph a few seconds later.
‘’Both Predator ships are breaking up in pieces! WE GOT THEM!’’
Wild cheers filled the cockpit of the heavy fighter at those words. However, their squadron leader soon returned them to the reality of their tactical situation.
‘’Good shooting, guys, but remember that we have at least two more Predator ships roaming around.’’
One minute later, their squadron leader was back on the radio.
‘’Belay my last, Prowler callsigns: those bums from the STAR EAGLES and the SPACE DEMONS just destroyed three Predator warships. There are no major Predator warships left in the system. We are thus free to go to Phase Two of our strike plan. However, the NOSTROMO has asked that a close air reconnaissance of that island below us be conducted, with our images to be retransmitted to the NOSTROMO. Prowler Five and Six, you’re it!’’
‘’Prowler Five, acknowledged!’’ replied Pieter Nordlung, happy to have been designated for that task.
05:43 (Universal Time)
Small craft hangar complex, A.M.S. NOSTROMO
In low orbit over TOI 1231 bc and approaching the Predator orbital station
‘’GET IN QUICKLY AND STRAP YOURSELVES IN YOUR SEATS, GUYS: THE DESCENT WILL BE QUICK AND ROUGH!’’
Jehanne then preached by example and firmly strapped herself in on one of the seats lining both sides of the assault barge’s cargo cabin. Eve Silisca, wearing a tactical vest,