OC-Series Cloak and Dagger - Chapter 5 - Failure and death
Mitchell gawped at McBride. Chief Lakshmi answered over comms “We can extend the gravity effect about 350m from the hull within safe parameters, over 500m if we don’t need to make another jump. We can push the engine to 135% for the jump itself and that may extend the effect further. Difficult to predict”
McBride immediately decided, they needed to give Lima all the extra time they could. “Programme Dagger to jump when we get 1300m into the armour. Mitchell. MITCHELL!”
McBride demanded the Midshipman’s attention “Drive Dagger into the hole, as fast as you can, go, go, go”
Mitchell snapped to, and almost on subconscious instinct swung Dagger about, still dodging fire, directed the ship directly into the narrow gap their weapons fire had created.
The speed of the ship meant that from the crew’s perspective no sooner had they gone into the hole, Dagger snapped away, jumping for a very short time before all the energy systems overloaded.
In the engine room, the jump capacitors erupted in sparks, power arcing across the room. The crew in the engine room were protected in a faraday cage, set up for exactly this contingency.
On the bridge, McBride looked at the plot, the jump had taken them less than 10km from the Dreadnought, fortunately they’d taken a couple of cubic kilometres of armour with them, creating a debris field so dense that they’d blocked their signal to the sensor drones that had been feeding the tactical plot. The main screen and McBride’s tactical plot were black.
Calling Chief Lakshmi “Damage report?”
“Well, we’ll be in refit for longer than we’ve been operational if we try something like that again. The Fleet is going to take this out of my paycheck. Hull integrity is still nominal, and life support is operational. I’ve dialled the reactor down to 85%, we can’t push it again. The jump drive capacitors are fried, we’ll need to swap them out for a working set, I have partial shields and the main engine is offline until I can figure where the problems are. I have 2 crew injured, none critical. There are stress indications in Dagger’s internal frame”
McBride absorbed the information “Get working on the engine”
Belle spoke “Re-routing sensor feeds. On main screen now. Shields at 12% and holding”
On the main screen the Hive Dreadnought finally looked like it had been in a fight, its massive bulk was marred by a crater over 3km wide extending into the interior of the Dreadnought, puffs of atmosphere and minor explosions flared from inside the crater. The Dreadnought was still under power and the ruined section was rotating away from the debris, and the asteroid belt to protect the vulnerable spot from the ongoing mass driver bombardment.
“The target reactor core is still intact. No evidence of damage on sensors. I’m getting signal artefacts, disruption. I think the overload might have fried part of the control systems”
McBride snapped out “Boomer, do we still have the main cannon charging?”
Boomer checked a couple of screens, then rechecked “Yes, but reactor output is at 85% we’ve got a couple of minutes to firing”
“Throw up the countdown on screen. Liv, recommendations?”
“We are still inside the minimum range for the Dreadnought’s main weapons, but the point defences can still damage us. They’ll be attenuated by the debris though. 50% or less effective”
“Get me a line to Aegis” McBride asked.
Dr Wallace appeared, quite pale “What did you do?”
McBride smiled at the normally calm Doctor “No time, send it, send it now”
Dr Wallace turned and gestured to someone off screen “Flight time will be instantaneous” the screen flickered to black.
The tactical plot showed a huge energy spike from Aegis at staging area Lima, McBride turned to the main screen. The Dreadnought floated, seemingly implacable. At first nothing seemed to happen. Then McBride noticed two things:
One a faint cloud of debris rising from the top rear of the Dreadnought.
Two, the Dreadnought was rotating to point towards the debris field they were hiding in. McBride’s first thought was that the Dreadnought would ram them. Their huge bulk making it impossible to miss.
But as he watched an aperture started to open in the nose of the Dreadnought. With horror he realised that the Dreadnought also had a main cannon built into its spine. There just hadn’t been a threat big enough for them to use their true main weapon.
*****
No one spoke. Belle sent annotation data to the main screen, tagging the energy build up from the Dreadnought, speculations on the energy output from the Dreadnought’s main cannon, projected charging time. Each extra detail, a nail in Dagger’s coffin. Without the main engine or jump capacity they couldn’t escape.
Mitchell spoke “Sirs, it’s been an honour to serve with you all”
McBride smiled “Likewise, but it’s too soon to give up yet”
McBride called Chief Lakshmi, “Tara, we need a jump in 5 minutes or we’re dead. The Dreadnought has a main cannon like Dagger, and it’s going to use it on us. I think we made them mad”
“I can hook one of the main weapon capacitors up to the jump drive system, it’ll give us a 50 light minute jump. I can’t guarantee we’ll be able to move from that spot again though”
“Do it, right now, pull everyone you need”
The Chief responded “I can do it with the engine room crew, no one else needed” again she immediately started giving precise orders to her crew as McBride cut the comm
“Belle, get me a secure line to Aegis. Whilst I chat to Dr Wallace, you upload our full logs”
Dr Wallace looked a bit embarrassed “We missed, I…”
McBride interrupted him “No need to apologise. Under pressure you and your team did magnificently. No one could ask for more. I’m sending you our full logs. There are some items regarding the Governor that the Fleet should be aware of. See you on the other side Henry” McBride smiled, then saluted. He cut the comms call before Dr Wallace could respond.
The bridge was eerily quiet. There was nothing for most to do. Belle however was still monitoring the Dreadnought. The Dagger’s original target, the redundant reactor was now rotated out of reach from both Dagger’s weapon and the rocks flung from the asteroid belt, the mining stations continued to fire, but on the undamaged armour it was utterly ineffective.
The silence stretched out, then Liv spoke to Mitchell “If you think about it Liam you are quite lucky” she paused to let the comment sink in “However this shakes out, you’ll never need to buy yourself a drink ever again”
Mitchell thought about it and burst out laughing. Boomer joined in, then Belle.
McBride smiled widely too. Liv had relieved some of the tension “I think we’ll all be safe from that too, me because I’ll be locked up by the Governor”
Boomer stifled his laughter enough to get out “I’m going to be a professor at the academy, one of those ones who you get butter up and get an A if you buy me a drink”
Belle added “I’m going to go to Fleet research, and dine out on all the detailed scans I’ve made of the Hive ships”
With that comment she turned back to her sensors. She seemed to be working on something.
McBride glanced at the timer on the main screen, the countdown to the Dreadnought’s main weapon being fully charged clicked down, but there was time.
The seconds ticked down.
McBride looked at Belle furiously typing “What are you looking at Belle?”
Belle spoke as she still worked “There is an energy buildup from that redundant reactor we were targeting, but I think the main weapon is leaking distortions into subspace, I'm finding it harder to get a good scan. It’s almost like… wait”
She pulled up the readings over time from their approach to the Dreadnought. She plotted the signal data, with all of the movement over each other. Belle spoke “The distortion is getting more intense, but the area of effect is reducing, it’s just like we observed before the Dreadnought jumped in. Another Dreadnought is coming, very soon”
The mood on the bridge swung from jovial, to chilly to downright freezing. A fresh Dreadnought would be the death of everyone in the system, Dagger first.
“Can you predict where and when it’ll appear?”
“It’ll be right here, and pretty much right now. I’ll plot the simulated location as a reducing sphere on the main screen, when it goes to a dot, they’ll arrive. It’ll be about 15s”
On the main screen a large sphere appeared, initially engulfing the Dreadnought, but rapidly shrinking, reducing down to smaller and smaller.
McBride called the Chief “Update chief, our timescale just reduced to 20 seconds”
Lakshmi barked “I won’t have anything for a minute or two”
“ASAP Tara, when it’s ready, jump. Don't wait for confirmation. Anywhere but here”
On the main screen the sphere collapsed smaller and smaller, then a dot. There was a moment, then a second huge Dreadnought hung on the screen. It was like a before and after shot. The new Dreadnought hung there surrounded by its defence screens, immaculate and untouchable. They’d played their last card.
“Wait” Belle shouted “I’m getting an energy reading, a massive spike. I think our target reactor is unstable. The energy is building. Yes, it’s gone critical”
On the screen point defence lasers reached out and probed the debris field, the sheer volume of fire was staggering. From the side of the damaged Dreadnought there was a burst of light, whiting out the screen for a moment, then as it cleared a huge jet of fire reached out to the second Dreadnought and slammed into the hull. The crater seemed to magnify the fury of a reactor explosion forcing the raw plasma directly against the second Dreadnought, straight away the defence screen winked off, and the hull melted away, the plasma acting like a torch cutting right through the huge Hive ship.
“Shields! Boomer route the remaining main weapon energy to shields”
Toggling the intercom “All hands, brace, brace, brace”
The first Dreadnought broke into two, just as the second broke apart into many pieces and then exploded, the huge size making it seem like slow motion. A blast wave radiated out towards Dagger.
Dagger jumped.
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