Crusade chapter 4 (standard:science fiction, 1881 words) [4/11] show all parts
Author: St George	Added: Mar 11 2003	Views/Reads: 2335/1721	Part vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
chapter 4

Once the ships had dropped back into real-space they took up stellar
orbit at 12 light minutes and Captain Tennit released a series of 
drones for target practice, as soon as a drone was detected on epdar 
the operators attempted to determine distance, bearing, speed and 
course; this information was immediately sent to the gunnery rooms and 
appeared on the bridge display, Carver then decided which turret should 
engage the target or order them to self target, in which case the 
gunnery officer would decide which target to engage with which turret. 

“Con, epdar, echo bearing 112 by 040,” shouted the bridge epdar officer.
Almost immediately the gunnery officer followed with “Firing solution 
loaded.” The target appeared, along with its projected course, on the 
floating holoscape above the pit. “Sierra two engage tango one,” called 
Carver, telling starboard (sierra) turret two to engage the target 
coded tango one. Because there was only one target out there all of the 
starboard turrets had been tracking it and almost immediately sierra 
two fired, the Etheric pulse raced toward the target at almost the 
speed of light, the pulse was invisible but it left in its wake a 
heat-haze like glimmer that distorted the stars behind, The drone was 
instantly vaporised by the equivalent energy of 8 kilotons of TNT. 

As well as the main turrets, the torpedo rooms and defensive armaments
were put through their paces. For practice dummy torpedoes were used 
but the real Harbinger 122 cm torpedoes were the most powerful ship to 
ship weapons on board; when fired they seek the target using on-board 
radar/epdar units or remote pilots and then when in range the torpedo 
uses a rail gun to fire a sliver of magnetised anti-iron into the 
target, a moment later the torpedo hits and detonates a 400 kiloton 
nuclear warhead. With an unshielded target the antimatter will punch a 
hole through the victims hull and allow the warhead to detonate within 
the vessel, making the harbinger superb against unshielded craft, but 
still effective against shields. The Harbinger was so impressive that 
the Andurils had requested some in order to study them. 

Four days later, during a shield test everything changed. 

“Con, epdar, large echo bearing 375 by 180,” cried the officer at the
epdar station. “Confirmed Sir, echo closing fast, it must be a ship,” 
came the second epdar station officer. “What is it? Whose is it?” 
demanded Carver. “Unknown Sir, but its big, at least a medium cruiser 
Sir.” “Sir, communication from Kerray-win,” said the Coms officer, 
“they want to know if its one of ours.” “Signal no, the only other ship 
that big is the Broadsword and she's at Io.” Then pressing his intercom 
button he said, “All hands battle stations! If it's not ours and its 
not theirs then there's only one other explanation. Red alert and get 
me a firing solution as soon as it drops into real-space.” “Sir 
Kerray-win is launching fighters,” reported the Sensor officer. “All 
weapons rooms report green light.” came the chief gunnery officer's 
voice over the intercom from her command room in the depth of the ship. 
“Excellent, signal Kerray-win we are combat ready, and send an encoded 
message to Mars appraising them of the situation. Helm come starboard 
042 degrees.” That would put the target directly starboard and allow 
maximum firepower. “Captain, the vessel is exiting hyperspace in 
3...2...1.... Now,.... We have a firing solution for target tango one,” 
said the bridge gunnery officer in an absolutely calm voice. “Sir, 
positive ident from Kerray-win, it's a Megaeran battleship!” 

Suddenly there was a muffled blast as a volley of EP bolts hit
Crusaders' shield, “Starboard array down 16% Sir,” came a shout from 
damage control. “All sierra turrets, let ‘em have it, fire at will, 
sierra torpedo, fire tubes one and six!” Cursing the fact that he had 
no fighters to deploy Carver watched the holoscape as the torpedoes 
raced toward the target; as he watched there was a violent shudder as 
all eight starboard EP canons fired. A moment later the enemy's second 
volley hit crusader's shields as at the same time Kerray-win fired a 
salvo of torpedoes. The enemy fighters did their best to destroy both 
Crusaders' and Kerray-win's torpedoes but despite superior numbers they 
were severely hampered by the Anduril fighters who quite obviously had 
superior skill. “Sierra torpedo, fire two, three, four and five.” 
Fighters had destroyed both of Crusaders' torpedoes but now they were 
on the run from the Anduril pilots and there was a good chance of a 
hit. Again the ship quaked as the massive canons fired and on the 
holoscape Carver saw the Anduril torpedoes hit the enemy's shields. 
Again the enemy turrets let fly their lethal energy. “Starboard array 
down to 22% Sir!” “Sierra torpedo fire one and six!” ordered Carver. 


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