Star Force: Flashpoint (SF8) Read online

  “So where does the difficulty lie?”

  “Escort duty would give us away, whether it be for ships or stations. We also have to avoid the traffic lanes or the ship radars will pick us up. Resupply will also be tricky. We either have to come into one of our stations or send supply ships out for rendezvous. If someone is monitoring our infrastructure that could give us away, just as I’m hoping their resupply lines do for them.”

  “What about the command ship?”

  Paul shook his head. “Too slow for a hunting expedition and too big to hide from radar. I won’t bring it in until we’ve gone public.”

  Davis glanced down at his desk thoughtfully for a moment. “We could actually be seeing the start of World War III with this…and if that’s to be the case let’s have us dictating the course of events. Bring in the fleet. Find out who’s responsible and take away their toys. Bonus points for prisoners,” he added, using one of the Trailblazer’s running jokes, which drew an appreciative smile from Paul. “I’ll start prepping for the political backlash.”

  “And Taiwan?”

  “I guess we just tell them what we know…massive hull damage killed the ship, two survivors recovered, and we’re still investigating the cause.”

  “They’ll know a bit more when they debrief the man,” Paul pointed out.

  “I’ll stall the return of the survivors for a while,” Davis said as if it was a tactic he used often. “They can’t exactly walk up and visit the hospital unannounced.”

  5

  When Paul left Davis’s office he walked to the nearest juncture of their secure transportation network, now with 42 location options on the control board. He selected the primary sanctum and sat back as the pod car zipped off through the city’s interior, eventually carrying him down through the foundations and connecting to a tunnel buried just beneath the seafloor, which took him out about 12km to Atlantis’s little undercover cousin.

  The sanctum was a city of its own, half built underground and half above, yet covered by meters of armor and even more of seafloor silt, creating an abrupt underwater mountain on the otherwise flat plateau. There was about 250 meters of water above the flat-topped peak, with the only entrances on the seafloor just off the perimeter of the mountain, to avoid the risk of becoming blocked by landslides. The entrances were collapsible garages, laying flat a meter or so above the seafloor and capable of rising up several stories to allow for entrance/egress, then closing back down for security and protection.

  The line Paul was travelling through was the backdoor approach which directly connected the sanctum with Atlantis and several other new underwater locations that the Archons traveled to frequently. Most of them lived inside the sanctum now, training continuously while a select few left for other assignments and duties. A handful of the trailblazers remained in their quarters block inside Atlantis, but otherwise the rest of them had moved into the sanctum along with 600 lesser Archons, who they kept training and little else.

  While Paul had risen to a level 8 adept, the newbs hadn’t progressed past level 3 save for a few exceptions. Jared was the highest ranked non-trailblazer at level 5, and from the 4th class, having caught up and surpassed the 200 adepts ahead of him in recent years. Clint and Levi were both level 4s and had demonstrated an aptitude for the naval disciplines, so he’d begun including them in some of the practical duties of running that division of the military, but for the most part everything outside the sanctum was run by the trailblazers while the other Archons just tried to close the skill gap with them…or more realistically, just increase their levels enough to prove their worth and be given a field assignment.

  The lowest ranked member of 1st class was Mark-084 at level 7, and he was pretty much on part time training, enough to cover the core workouts and a few electives, but his main emphasis had been on developing a decent core of aerofighter pilots using combat simulations alone, given that they couldn’t practice anything more than simple maneuvers in the atmosphere where satellite surveillance could pick them up.

  He’d been working hard at developing his own piloting skills in the skeets, and then teaching the recruits Davis had provided him to not only fly the unusual hover-capable craft, but to break down their bad habits and rebuild them into capable fighters. After having washed out two thirds of the initial class he’d gotten a small group that he’d been comfortable with and focused on their training for more than two years before adding any others, then using that core group to teach additional recruits through example, further building and growing their aerofighter core…all being done quietly inside Atlantis where no one would be the wiser.

  Even with that challenge on his shoulders Mark had been able to continue advancing his skills at a faster pace than most of the other classes. Both he and the other trailblazers had developed a knack for training and pushing their abilities into the unknown, while the others, even with the benefit of the experience of those who had come before them, often plateaued after a breakthrough and/or had difficulty in training continuously, being more comfortable with long training blocks of days or weeks with short breaks in between, which Paul and the others knew diminished the gains, but they couldn’t seem to make the newbs understand, even after more than a decade had passed for the 2nd class.

  Paul had seen some of them come around, slowly, and there was a general consensus amongst the trailblazers that if they kept them contained and doing nothing but training for the indeterminate future they would eventually develop the necessary training skills, along with an occasional kick in the butt when they required it. Bottom line was they weren’t up to par yet as a group, and they were only given the individuals who were beginning to rise to the challenge a little more leash to work with. Otherwise, everything Archon-related within Star Force was exclusively the work of the trailblazers.

  They’d split up the duties as they liked, but a group of them had opted for training only, seeing how far they could go and laying the benchmarks for the others that were splitting their time with military development duties, thus making their training hours a bit more efficient by taking out the need to experiment.

  Morgan headed up that group and had risen to the highest rank yet obtained…level 16, a full two levels ahead of Jace who had a solid lock on 2nd place. Four others held level 13, with the remainder of the 100 stretched out down to Paul’s level 8, which begrudged him a bit at having been outdone, but the fleet that he, Liam, and Roger were building was going to be the linchpin of the entire military so it wasn’t like his hours were being wasted. So long as he continued advancing up the skill ranks…and stayed ahead of the newbs…he was content to work through at his own pace and reign in his competitiveness with regards to the other trailblazers.

  Specialization had been inevitable, but the core workouts and ranking levels kept them all tied together and focused on advancement, despite the distractions of their ancillary work…something that the newbs just weren’t ready for yet.

  When Paul’s pod reached the sanctum he exited in approximately the middle of what was a double pyramid, blunted point up and point down. From there he hopped into the nearest elevator and made his way to the naval command and control center.

  Clint was on watch when he arrived, doing little more than babysitting in case anyone in their small fleet required Archon assistance, which meant running and getting Paul, Liam, or Roger to handle any unusual situations. If not, then he’d simply relay standing orders and handle communications as if he were a secretary…a necessary function, but one that didn’t require any great expenditure of physical or mental resources and would allow the newbs to continue training while getting just a hint of ‘field work’ even though they were still restricted to the sanctum.

  As Paul walked into the large, segmented room capable of servicing 20+ crew he saw Roger working over on a design table and snapped his fingers to get his attention.

  “Game on,” Paul said, with Roger immediately taking his meaning as he turned to face Clint. “Get me a network
link to Harper, Minsk, and Voss.”

  Clint raised a curious eyebrow but said nothing as he got to work making the contacts.

  Roger left his design work and walked over to stand beside Paul in front of the main communications screen that Clint was sitting in a booth beneath. It segmented into three pieces with standby icons quickly appearing one two…the last of which took an additional five minutes before it connected and the feeds went live, showing the torsos of three men, each wearing the vivid dark purple Star Force naval military uniforms.

  “Sorry,” Harper apologized. “Caught me in the head.”

  Paul dismissed the delay with a quick nod. “Two days ago a civilian transport was hit, Star Force make, Taiwan owned, Leo-class. We recovered the sensor records and two survivors, both of which indicate they were attacked by an unknown class of warship of Earth construction. We’re bringing the fleet in to hunt it down.”

  Voss whistled appreciatively.

  “What are we dealing with?” Harper asked.

  Roger nodded at Clint and he forwarded the sensor records and capability guestimates.

  “It’s a corvette, armed with missiles at least, and has some minimal radar stealthing,” Paul explained. “It launched on the Leo at range, so we didn’t get a good visual image. We’ve pieced together what we could to get the approximate shape. Where it is now we don’t know, I didn’t want to risk sending civilian ships out looking so it either got away or is laying in wait. Either way, it’s staying away from known radar detection zones and has a shipyard off the grid as well. We’ve confirmed that it did not originate from any known yard, so there’s another mystery for you to unravel.”

  “We also don’t know how many of them there are,” Roger added.

  Minsk frowned. “Orion isn’t suited for a search mission.”

  “No it’s not,” Paul agreed, referring to the massive command ship, “which is why you’re not going…but your support ships are.”

  The Captain nodded his understanding.

  “The two battleships will head up the hunting parties, but the Orion will fly its fleet in towards the planet until you’re in better signal range. Atlantis will handle any piloting duties in close to the planet.

  “What if we’re not in position when the fireworks start?” Harper asked.

  “We won’t engage with a signal lag,” Paul declared. “We’ll wait until one of you can arrive. I doubt this warship has engine capability anywhere near ours, so it shouldn’t be able to run our ships down. Otherwise we should be able to fly them by remote as mobile radar platforms without too much trouble.”

  “What about jamming?” Voss asked.

  “I doubt anyone’s even equipped for that yet,” Paul said, aware of the danger, which was why he’d designed the drone warships with multiple communications platforms. “Until they know we exist and we’re flying by remote we shouldn’t encounter any problems.”

  “But it will be a weak signal,” Minsk pointed out.

  “For combat, yes, but we’ll have one of the battleships in proximity by then,” Paul explained unnecessarily. Minsk was just being overly cautious.

  “I assume you’ll want us on different sides of the planet?” Harper guessed.

  “More or less. We’ll get you assigned search zones within the hour, but right now I just want to get you moving. We have no idea when this warship will strike again…and the next time it could be one of ours.”

  “Are we taking everything?” Voss asked.

  “All but two,” Paul said firmly. “Leave a pair of destroyers, we’ll need the smaller ships.”

  “Are we doing this quiet or bold?” Harper asked.

  “Quiet,” Paul said, appreciating the question. “No transponders or flybys. Keep your distance and out of sight until we find our target. We’ll advise then.”

  “No clue at all who we’re after?” Minsk asked.

  “Nothing,” Paul said, frustration evident in his voice. “Whoever’s done this has hid their tracks well. We’ve got our eyes peeled for any surreptitious supply lines, and hopefully we’ll come up with something on your way here, otherwise you’ve got a lot of space to cover.”

  “Speaking of which?” Voss asked.

  “We’ll bring the refuelers to you,” Paul assured him. “Just get here as soon as you can.”

  “Any chance of getting us some extra pilots?” Harper asked.

  “How many can you take?”

  “I’d like four more, if possible.”

  “I could make room for three,” Voss added.

  Paul exchanged glances with Roger, who nodded confidently.

  “We’ll make something happen,” Paul promised.

  “Do you want me to transfer some of mine?” Minsk asked.

  Paul shook his head. “Too far out of the way.”

  “If and when we do find the enemy, what are our orders?” Harper asked.

  “Disable and capture, preferably.”

  “We’ll need boarding parties for that.”

  “You’ll have them.”

  Harper nodded. “Permission to get underway?”

  “Burn whatever fuel you have to…just get here fast. I don’t like having a fox in the hen house.”

  “Understood,” Voss echoed with a half-clenched jaw. “Just make sure the refuelers are standing by. Given our current position we’re going to have to suck our reserves dry to get there.”

  “They’ll be waiting,” Paul promised as the three Captains signed off. Roger immediately went to the map table and began tagging available ships to divert for resupply duty while Clint waited for orders.

  “Pull up the crew rosters,” Paul said absentmindedly as he was already mentally sifting through available personnel, “see how many active remote pilots we have in the field, then pull the files on the reserves. We may have to do some crew swapping.”

  Captain Voss leaned back in his command chair, taking a moment to let the seriousness of the situation sink in before he glanced to his left at the rows of fleet control remote stations, all currently empty. Right now the bridge was occupied by him and his third in command at the ops station directly to his left.

  “Wake everyone up,” he ordered after a pensive pause. “We’ve got work to do.”

  “This is it then?”

  “It is, and we’ve got a fleet of civilian ships to protect so we can’t waste time.”

  “Be back in a sec,” the junior officer said, jumping out of his seat and rushing off to gather the rest of the crew, most of which were probably in their bunks, leaving Voss alone on the bridge of the 1050m long battleship, tucked safely inside a rotating cylinder encased within a protective ‘needle’ of armor designed to deflect rail gun rounds if/when they penetrated the ship’s ten meter thick armor plates.

  The needle stood horizontally within the wedge-shaped ship, with the long prow and thick engine compartments providing physical barriers to slow rounds entering the ship through sheer mass. Likewise there were two blocky ‘star destroyer’ towers extending above and below the ship, likewise blocking for the needle’s weak angles, leaving the sharp tips pointing port and starboard along the thinnest approach vectors, providing the maximum deflection coverage possible.

  Any rounds making it that far in then had to deal with the armored needle before breaching the gravity cylinders inside, stacked one on top of the other. The bridge was located in the bottom portion of the port, centering it in the ship as much as possible. The living quarters were located solely in the needle, with the rest of the ship being made up of automated systems and a small hangar bay that connected to the needle from the front, along the most protected angled, through a Z-shaped entryway to prevent a lucky spearing shot from getting through.

  Voss appreciated the thought behind the design, knowing that it would give his ship extended battle life, but most of the searching and fighting was going to be accomplished by the support fleet lazily drifting alongside the Turok in extreme high orbit around Earth, taking a slow lap aroun
d the planet in a 120-day orbit, far from any prying eyes as they ran through test maneuvers and simulations, getting in some time away from the shipyard and civilization to get the crew acclimated to deep space assignments.

  In truth it was a highly boring game of waiting until Star Force decided to bring them into the mix…which now they had. Problem was the Turok was a massive war machine and not easy to move about without expending an insane amount of fuel, which Paul had just licensed Voss to do. In the rear of the ship stood 42 high-thrust plasma engines, along with 8 others spaced around the ship for ‘quick’ maneuvering that kept the ship mobile when it wanted to be…and now was one of those times.

  As soon as the crew was woken up and brought up to speed on the situation the pilot ramped up the engines past 20% for the first time, reaching all the way up to 60% for a long duration burn to cut sharply across the orbital angles and head them down in towards the planet on a more or less direct route. The fleet control pilots onboard took their positions in 13 of the 16 bridge stations, linking up to the surrounding support ships and keeping them in formation around the Turok, which wasn’t difficult considering their smaller masses.

  In Voss’s fleet were 6 cutters, 2 corvettes, 1 frigate, 3 destroyers, and 1 of the new heavy destroyers, just two months out of dry-dock. All were unmanned and remote controlled with various modular weapons platforms, but the heavy destroyer was the first Star Force design that came with a non-modular primary rail gun running the length of the H-shaped hull, more than doubling the barrel length of its modular cousins and thus increasing firing speed.

  The Turok also had a rail gun mount running down the centerline…but it was a heavy version with a 600m long barrel, making for one hell of a naval chess piece to maneuver across the map, but it wasn’t something to be used hunting smaller ships, given that the weapon had to be pointed along the Z-axis and could only move as fast as the ship could turn. Still, when dealing with stations or large ships it made for a potent deterrent…or at least it would whenever the public found out it existed.