1145 hours CST, June 24th, 2673; the bridge of the Skate

“VSO, where’s the nearest asteroid?” Murphy asked Petty Officer Yosufzai.

“Bearing three-forty-two degrees by positive thirty-two degrees. Range is fifty-two thousand, two hundred metres, sir!” she almost shouted back to the commander.

Murphy checked the status of the crew on the console and made sure everyone was ready. He moved the crew readiness report to one of the screens above him so it would be out of the way but easy to check. Everyone was ready and strapped in. He still opened the boat-wide intercom for a last word with his crew with one hand, and used his other hand to make the asteroid as a waypoint for the helmsman.

“Crew, this is Lieutenant Murphy speaking. We are about to start our investigation of the cloaked area. Keep yourself strapped in. We are about to start a five-G run, and we will have many after. Five seconds to five-G acceleration, bridge out.” He shut off the intercom and brought up a five-second count on the tactical display.

“Helm, get us to that asteroid,” he ordered when the count reached zero.

Lead Hart was ready. Her eyes were on the countdown, and as soon as it hit zero, she pushed the throttle all the way forward till it hit the limit. She pulled back on the control stick and aimed the boat at the asteroid. The torpedo boat shot forward, and the engines quickly throttled up to the full acceleration as the helmsman brought the black-hulled boat into line.

The five-G acceleration lasted for only twenty-six seconds before Hart pulled back on the throttles and quickly flipped the boat end for end. Fifteen seconds after she cut the boat’s acceleration, she pushed the throttles forward again to decelerate the craft at the maximum rate.

She had timed it almost right, as the Skate was extending its landing gear and coming to a solar orbit parallel to the asteroid, only fifty metres away. She did not have much time to figure out the best approach with the flight time of just over a minute. Rushing toward a large chunk of rock that would not even feel the impact of the Skate took more time than she was given to do it right. She was able to bring the boat down the last fifty metres without help of the tethers and settled the boat down in the shadow of the asteroid.

“Now we wait to see if they saw us,” Murphy said to himself as he settled down to wait with the rest of the crew. With luck the torpedo boat’s black hull would allow it to remain hidden on the dark side of the mass of rock. Murphy did not want to tap heat sinks into this asteroid, just in case they needed to make a quick getaway.

Five minutes passed, and then ten. Murphy waited even longer before he ordered the boat to leave the asteroid. He was starting to get concerned, but he hid it well. We can’t be this lucky, and they can’t be this stupid.

The crew of TBC-473 had been incredibly lucky so far. They had not needed to fire their guns in anger, though they had come close. The pirate fleet had not spotted them yet, though Murphy was beginning to have his doubts that it was a pirate fleet. That could not last, but he was not going to turn back now.

He leaned back on his chair as his boat drifted in space, floating along with the asteroid, making a good imitation of space junk. Murphy continued to think about the situation. He looked over to his signals officer.

“Kostya, you studied advanced electronics at the Academy, right?”

“Yes sir, how did you know?”

“All signals officers I know have. You probably also studied antenna design and RF, right?”

“Yes sir, I did. I wasn’t very good at antenna design, though.”

“Do you think you could look at the HHE spec for me?”

“What do you want me to look for, sir?”

“Can you see if you can focus the emitter so that we get a denser stream of ions out front?”

“I can look into it, sir.”

“Do so. See if you can get me an answer in an hour. We’ll warn you if we have to make any manoeuvres.”

“Yes sir,” she said and unbuckled herself from the bridge. Murphy cancelled the alert, telling the crew to get some food and rest while they had a chance.

* * *

“Sir, the HHE doesn’t really use an antenna,” Lieutenant Sinkovich reported to Murphy less than an hour later. “Instead, it uses a sphere that is perforated that extends from the HHE and away from the ship while it’s active. It’s about five metres wide, and when a pulse is needed, the hydrogen is shot out from each of the holes.”

“Oh, so we can’t increase the flow out one side then?”

“Well, not easily. We would have to make some modifications to it, but with your permission, we can try to remove the power from half of the emitters and run the power in series to the other half to increase the voltage. That should increase the flow, but we can also burn out the emitters.”

Murphy thought about the choice for a moment. “Do it. I’ll enter the orders into the log. How long do you think it will take?”

“I’ll work with Petty Officer Butler and the rest of the mechanics. It’ll probably take up at least two hours. There are a lot of emitters, and we’ll have to work in a confined space.”

“Go to it, Lieutenant. Keep the bridge informed of any problems.”

It took most of the estimated two hours before Lieutenant Sinkovich reported back to the bridge. “I think it’s ready, sir.”

“Thank you, let’s see if it works. Lieutenant Ridgard, deploy the HHE. Make sure you monitor the state of the emitters.”

“Aye sir, deploying the HHE now.”

Torpedo bay three’s door opened, and the HHE was pushed out into the vacuum of space. The pod settled into its position, and the five-metre sphere that emitted the hydrogen ions was pushed farther out from the boat and locked into position.

“Helm, point us toward the cloaked area. ESO, turn on the HHE and report what you get.”

About ten seconds later, the first reports from the HHE came back. The photons from the decaying radioactive isotopes were being received. A radioactive isotope decayed in a predictable fashion. Over the half-life period, half of the isotope would decay; over the next half-life period, half the remaining would decay. The decay would continue until there was no more left. When the isotopes ran into the boundary of the cloaked area, they went no farther. They also seemed to disappear.

By increasing the density of the emitted isotopes in one direction, Murphy had increased the resolution of the HHE. This allowed the boat to get a finer picture of the cloaked area, and they discovered it was not a perfect sphere. It was actually nowhere close to being a sphere and looked to be several spheres interlocked.

Another hour passed as they surveyed the area. The time was approaching 1445 hours when Murphy called a halt to the survey. He looked at the tactical display and the surface of the cloaked area.

“We’re running out of time,” Murphy said and looked around the bridge. The officers were still there, even though it was still the morning watch. “Bell, Ridgard, Sinkovich, conference time.” He did not want to leave the bridge, but he also did not want to talk to the other officers in front of the enlisted personnel. He gathered the officers around his chair and spoke quietly.

“We need to get into that area and find out what’s there. I don’t know when or if the Clearwater fleet is going to show up. We either need to get a second message beacon out or go ourselves to deliver the intel. If the fleet got our first message, you can be sure they’ll be here soon. But we still have a few questions that we need answers for. Why is there such a large force of pirate vessels close to Clearwater? Why are they acting in such a disciplined manner? And why is there a cloaked area here?

“So we need to get into that area. We haven’t found any chinks in their armour yet, and it would be suicide to go through the cloak. If it’s anything like the cloaking shields that NTF used during the war, it’s a thick-skinned gravity bubble that a few shield ships are projecting out. The transition area is filled with randomly changing gravity. Anything going through it will get torn apart by the tidal forces. So, do you have any suggestions to get through it, or to at least see what’s on the other side?”

“We could try to drift in after a patrol of fighters,” Lieutenant Bell offered immediately. “They’d have to open it up then.”

Murphy thought it over. “No, I don’t think so. We haven’t seen their patrols come out, and after the four groups that went after the message beacon, we haven’t see any go through either. I’d like to do it that way, but we can’t count on it. We also don’t know their patrol or shuttle schedule. The other problem is we would have to match their velocity, and they would be decelerating. That means we would have to be decelerating as well, and pointing our engines right at them. They’re sure to see us.”

“If it’s a gravity bubble, it’s probably just hiding what’s in there with gravity lensing,” Sinkovich suggested tentatively. “We could try to program the computers to resolve the image.”

“I think doing that would take too long. I know there’s no such thing as a truly random pattern, but we’d have to discover what their random number generator is. I don’t think we have that kind of time.”

“We could use one of our Mark Fifteens, sir,” Ridgard said when no one else spoke up. “The shield-bore laser on the tip of it should be able to open a hole in their cloak so it can slip through. If we program the Mark Fifteen to go after the shield generator, then it should knock out one of the shield ships and let us in.”

“I’d rather not waste half our offensive strength on a chance to get in. The Mark Fifteen could get itself destroyed on the way in, despite the shield-bore laser. But I don’t see any other option right now.” He looked at the three junior lieutenants. “Any other options?” His reply was a shake of their heads.

Murphy let out a sigh and nodded. “OK, we’ll have to go with the Mark Fifteen torpedo. Lieutenant Bell, make sure you have a course plotted through the opening when it appears. I want to get as many contacts as possible plotted. Lieutenant Sinkovich, I want you monitoring their transmissions and see if you can crack their coding. I also want you to feed all the sensor information, logs, and everything else you can into the second beacon. Feed it in raw. We won’t have time to filter any of it.

“We’re going to kick up a hornet’s nest when we go in. Lieutenant Ridgard, we aren’t going to fire off our second torpedo unless we have to, but I want you to get firing solutions laid to the nearest ships as quickly as possible. We might have to fire it to escape.” He left the most important thing unsaid: the chances of them being able to complete their mission and escape were low. “Everyone understand your orders?”

A chorus of “Yes sir!” sounded, much like the breaking of a huddle during a team sporting event. Murphy was expecting it but not the enthusiasm. He hoped the enlisted crew would pick up on the feeling. The three officers returned to their stations, and Murphy looked through the status of the boat. He then looked left and right to the two sensor operators.

“Report all contacts,” he ordered simply.

“Visual has no contacts other than asteroids, sir.”

“No emissions have been detected, sir.”

“Thank you. Secure the HHE. Helm, point us away from the cloaked area, and move us about three hundred fifty kilometres away. Then bring us to a halt. Be ready for five-G acceleration for two minutes.”

Murphy still worried about the lack of response from what was obviously a hostile force. He leaned back on his chair again, looked up at the manning charts he still had on the overhead screen, and then turned on the intercom.

“Morning watch, report to the mess and get a meal. Be back on duty in twenty minutes. Afternoon watch, report to the mess in twenty minutes. Night watch, report to the mess after they’re through. Everyone is to be at his combat station in sixty minutes.” He paused to take a breath.

“Crew, we will be engaging in combat in sixty minutes or less. Get yourself a hot meal, but make sure it’s a light meal. You don’t want to vomit it back up into your helmet.” He gave the advice in the tone of a combat veteran speaking to unblooded warriors. His tone was more like a big brother than a commanding officer.

“I know we’ve been at battle stations for a while, and I expect we will be at battle stations for a good portion of the remainder of the time in the system. If any of you think of anything that might help us in the next sixty minutes, tell your section heads. Till then, get yourself a meal. Bridge out.”

There were no threats in the area that the Skate knew about. It was time to get the crew fed and as mentally prepared as possible. The status of the crew worried Murphy. The number of veterans on the crew was small. The men and women manning the turrets would have to do their duties without the benefits of firsthand experience and knowing what to expect.

Murphy spent the next hour getting himself a meal in the mess with the rest of the crew. He made sure they saw him as calm, collected, and ready, but most important of all, he was approachable and there to calm their fears. He was still young by navy standards, and still a junior officer. He could still be approached by the crew.

During the hour he took some time to go over what he was going to say to the crew when he launched the boat into combat. He was nervous about that. He had some commanding officers who just brought a ship into a combat zone, and he had others who tried to pump up the crew beforehand. He decided to try the latter and see what happened.

The hour passed, and Murphy was ready, or as ready as he was going to get given the circumstances. The Skate was his first command. It was also the first command he took into combat. He leaned back into the watch officer’s chair and sighed softly to himself. Any mistake he made from here on out could cost the lives of his crew. The weight of duty and responsibility started to weigh on his shoulders.

“Offensive, is the torpedo programmed?”

“Yes sir, the program is holding in the targeting computer, and it is ready to be flushed to the torpedo on firing. I recommend using the portside torpedo. The starboard torpedo checks out slightly better. Both are in spec, but I recommend saving the starboard torpedo in case we need it.”

“Noted. We’ll fire as you recommend. Be ready.”

Murphy reached for the intercom panel and almost hesitated before opening up the ship-wide channel. He flipped the switch, and the whistle went throughout the boat, calling everyone’s attention to the announcement he was about to make.

“Crew of the TBC-four-seventy-three, this is the commanding officer speaking.” He started out formally and then thought he might as well go for it. When he restarted, his voice was firmer as he started again.

“Fellow crewmen of the Skate, this is the captain speaking. We are about to engage in combat with forces unknown. Our mission to Sigma Delta Four was to investigate pirate activity and report back. We found some, a fleet the size of which we have never seen in the Clearwater area since the war. We could have completed our mission by just reporting about it to the Clearwater fleet.

“But as you all know, there are some outstanding questions, questions we need to answer fully to complete our mission to my satisfaction. We discovered a shuttle going off to some random area, and in that area, the area where we are now, we found a cloaking field. The field is large enough to cover that pirate fleet twice over.

“The Clearwater fleet is on its way.” He did not know that for sure, but he was not above some misrepresentation if it got the crew to be just a bit more competent. “And they might be walking into a trap. There’s a surprise here, hiding behind the cloaking field, and we are going to find out what it is. You have already gone above the call of duty, but you can do more.

“This will be the first naval battle fought by the forces of the Republic of Terrace since the war with New Terra Firma, and you are going to be the first of a new group of veterans. A great general once said that all men and women are scared during the first battle. It may take you a minute to get over it, it might take you an hour, it might take you days. But know that you are men and women of the Terrace Republic Navy, and there is no finer fighting force in the explored galaxy.

“There is no shame in being scared. A real sailor will not let the fear of death overcome his sense of honour, his sense of duty to his nation, and most important, a real sailor won’t let his mates down.

“We are lucky to know who the enemy is. We know who the friendlies are. We are the only friendly boat in the system. You do not need to check your fire and worry about hurting friendly forces. If it moves, shoot it.”

Murphy took another deep breath before he concluded. “I have full confidence and faith in every one of you. We will complete our mission today, far beyond what any other ship has done since the war. Captain Murphy out.”

When the final logs and report of this action came to light, he was probably going to get some flak for that speech. He also knew that he was plagiarising and paraphrasing Patton in his speech, but he did not have time to come up with his own.

“Lieutenant Ridgard, fire the portside torpedo.”

“Aye aye, sir.” Ridgard’s hands moved to the controls. The fifty-five-metre-long doors on the portside of the Skate opened, and the massive cylinder of the Mark 15 torpedo was exposed to space. The operation took seconds, and Ridgard checked the readings till they showed green. The torpedo was locked into position on the outer rack.

“Mark Fifteen is in firing position. I’m flushing the program from the targeting computer to the torpedo now, sir. Mission: Eliminate the source of the cloak.” Ridgard was going through the slow checklist since they did not have to make a snapshot.

“Program is downloading to the torpedo, firing in ten seconds.” The Mark 15 torpedo was an intelligent weapon. The first ten metres of the torpedo housed the sensors, the shield-bore laser, the shield, and most importantly, the computer system. The computer was almost as powerful as a supercomputer and held a database of all known ships, fighters, missiles, and tactics for the past fifty years. It was also wired as an overachiever and had something close to a full artificial intelligence and personality.

The final programming was not sent to the torpedo until the last few seconds before launch. While the program was not a full AI and was limited in its ability and its personality, the operators of the torpedo did not want it to develop a personality as it waited, processing in silence, ready to launch and destroy itself.

“Full program has been loaded, running as instructed. All telemetry shows it is ready to fire. Firing the torpedo now, sir!” Ridgard hit the button and fired the torpedo off toward the cloaked area.