The bridge, Katadromiko 2, approaching Dresse, Dresse system
Captain Gastion Whipper watched as the holomap above him reset following their final jump into the Dresse system.
With the planet Dresse having a katapato red designation, regulations dictated they were required to jump in behind one of the system’s stars, cloak and only then approach the planet.
He glanced over at the semicircle of array officers poring over the data coming in as they emerged from behind the star.
‘Any sign of the freighter and our gunship?’ he asked.
‘No, Captain,’ wasn’t the reply he wanted. Grunting and sitting back in his raised seat, he gazed up at the blue planet growing ever larger above. ‘Where the hell are Loftt and Mye?’ he said more to himself than any of his bridge crew around him.
‘I have a small amount of debris, sir,’ said one of the array officers glancing up at him questioningly.
‘Ship debris?’ he asked.
‘Yes, sir. Judging by its speed and distance from the planet, I would estimate whatever happened occurred around eight hours ago if the event happened near the planet.’
Whipper grunted again.
‘Can we tell if it’s freighter or gunship?’ he questioned.
‘The composition dictates a ninety percent certainty it’s freighter, sir.’
Whipper nodded and pointed at the planet growing quickly now as they approached and skirted around one of Dresse’s three moons.
‘Anything on the surface?’
‘No, sir—oh, hold that report, sir,’ said the array officer. ‘I have a marginal reading from a poor aspect. Just waiting for us to navigate around the planet a little more to get a firm reading.’
The bridge went quiet as the officer tapped away on his console for a few moments.
‘It’s the gunship, sir,’ he said, looking up at the captain and nodding.
‘What the hell’s Loftt doing on the surface?’ he mumbled.
‘It’s quite badly damaged too, Captain.’
‘Ah, that’s just wonderful,’ Whipper grumbled. ‘Any indigenous population anywhere near?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Well, thank the ancients for that,’ he said. ‘What about Loftt or Mye, or the freighter for that matter?’
‘Nothing, sir.’
‘Is the gunship in a condition to re-orbit?’
‘Negative, sir.’
‘What has he been up to?’ Whipper groaned. ‘Get a recovery ship down there quickly and quietly before it freaks the locals out. Don’t open a hangar planet-side either, just in case there’s an astronomer being nosey.’
‘There’s something odd with the population too, Captain,’ said another of the bridge crew.
‘In what way?’ Whipper asked.
‘Records of this planet from a few hundred years ago show a large population spread over the two main continents in many cities using mainly fossil fuels. They had flight but were non-spacefaring.’
‘What’s changed?’
‘Everything, sir,’ she said, her brow furrowing. ‘Cities in ruins, no flight of any kind and a population a fraction of its original size all living in small primitive villages.’
‘Perhaps they had a war or something,’ said Whipper, as he watched an engineering ship leave one of the larger port hangars.
He turned suddenly as a shout from the opposite side of the bridge caught his attention.
‘Multiple missiles incoming,’ shouted one voice.
The huge vessel shuddered as dozens of heavy lasers struck their shields.
‘Laser fire from at least twelve cloaked positions,’ called another.
‘What the fuck,’ shouted Whipper, jumping to his feet. ‘Where did all these come from?’
‘Shields at forty-one percent and dropping,’ came a call that the captain couldn’t ignore.
‘Pilot, emergency jump, now,’ he bellowed.
The pilot was quick, but the ship still lurched to one side a fraction of a second before the jump took place. Alarms screamed their protests from more than half the bridge stations and an explosion at one console threw three crew across the floor.
‘Are we away?’ the captain called, clambering off the floor where he’d been thrown and sliding back into his seat.
‘Yes, sir,’ came a call from navigation.
‘Get a medical team in here,’ he shouted, pointing at the wounded officers on the far side of the bridge. ‘Damage report?’ he continued, turning to glare at the first officer.
‘Multiple hull breaches, Captain,’ was the reply, as the stern-faced officer stared at his screens. ‘The array has taken a hit and propulsion is offline.’
‘Do we have any idea who the hell that was?’ Whipper asked.
‘No, sir. There were at least twelve sizeable vessels, they were cloaked and using tycelerin warhead missiles. It was one of those that hit our shields as we jumped that caused the damage. If we hadn’t jumped, we would most likely have been destroyed.’
Whipper glanced up at the holomap. It was glitching, fading in and out and showing very little.
‘Are we safe here, wherever we are?’ he asked. ‘Are they able to follow?’
‘The jump was un-embedded, Captain,’ replied the navigator. ‘We’re fifty-six light years away in clear space, so they’re likely to follow us and our cloaking is down.’
‘Damn. Get engineering teams on-to this immediately, priority propulsion, the cloak and the array.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Who the hell would use tycelerin missiles?’ he mumbled, as a medical team rushed in. ‘They’ve been outlawed for generations.’
‘Within the GDA worlds,’ said the first officer. ‘I have a feeling they weren’t GDA. Only we have shipborne lasers of that power and they had top-notch cloaking too.’
‘No wonder Loftt’s ship was damaged,’ said Whipper. ‘I’m amazed he avoided all that in a gunship and was able to land the bloody thing.’
‘Are we reporting the freighter as destroyed, sir?’ a crew member asked.
Whipper thought about that for a few moments before answering.
‘Send a drone back to Dasos with all the information we have, but don’t confirm the freighter as lost quite yet. There was debris, but only a very small amount. Not enough to warrant an entire ship.’
‘Understood. On its way, sir.’
‘How are we doing on the hull breaches?’ he asked.
‘Temporary shield zones employed, Captain. Main shields are up and back to full strength.’
Whipper nodded and watched as one of the injured bridge crew was stretchered past him.
‘Other casualties?’ he asked.
‘Several hundred injured and seventeen unaccounted for at the present time, sir,’ came the subdued reply.
His brow furrowed as he watched the stretcher party leave the bridge.
‘I don’t know who these fuckers are,’ he growled, ‘but they’re going to pay dearly for this. Have all weapons systems that are still operational charged and on full alert. The fighters out too.’
‘All of them, sir?’
‘Yes. If any one of those bastards follows us, give them everything we’ve got.’
‘Are you authorising the nukes too, sir?’
‘I did say everything.’