Chapter 9

"Learn to lead in a nourishing manner.

Learn to lead without being possessive.

Learn to be helpful without taking the credit.

Learn to lead without coercion."

~ Laozi

WarpStar

The Command Information Center played a symphony of mechanical brilliance. The hum from the air recyclers produced a harmonic tune with the hum of the ventilation systems. The melody was beating away in perfect sync with some of the sensor equipment. The percussion lines were being played the boots of the crew and taps of the fingers on the equipment. It all produced a song of life, as there were no other signs of it. Most of the crew wore headsets and were deeply involved in their various sensor systems and communicating with their various departments throughout the ship. The room did not have any light sources except those being produced from the monitors and datapads.

Ensign Jennifer Smedly was proud of her C.I.C. It ran smoothly, perfect enough to conduct her makeshift symphony. The crew who served under her in the department had mixed feelings about her, as she was younger than most of them. Just turning nineteen, she was already an ensign and had considerable experience in the C.I.C., including managing the department onboard the late Dreadnaught Avenger. Her crew was well-disciplined and was trained well under her. No one let any animosity affect their work.

Ensign Smedly had a ritual that most C.I.C. commanders did not follow in practice. Every so often, she would make her rounds and glance at the screens of all her crew's monitors. It was not that she didn't trust any of them, but she believed fresh eyes every so often would be the difference between life or death. The C.I.C. was the eyes and the ears of any ship. While the bridge had access to all the sensors and all the information the C.I.C. had, they didn't have two junior officers dedicated to monitoring each individual sensor. The Ops station on the bridge was the one who had the most access to the sensors, so whoever was on Ops duty would glance at them all. The C.I.C. had twenty crew members looking at the sensors and fifteen more who relayed information to and from the C.I.C.

The C.I.C. commander glanced at the optical station and asked for a report. Seeing something she found to be odd, she was hoping to get a concrete answer.

"All scopes clear, ma’am, nothing to report," Petty Officer first class James Farehay replied, glancing at his station several times before reporting.

"All scopes, Sitrep." Jennifer stood behind optical, staring at the screen, something not sitting right with her.

The senior technician on each scope sounded off.

"Graviton, clear."

"Thermals, clear."

"Radar, offline, set to passive."

"Lidar, offline, set to passive."

"Theta, offline, set to passive."

"Opticals, clear."

"Electro-Magnetics, clear."

"Neutrinos, clear"

"Ladar offline, set to passive."

"Radio, clear."

The chief petty officer on duty gave the official call: "All scopes clear, ma’am."

"Optical, recheck your scope. All passive systems check bearing one-nine-five, zero-degree drift," Jennifer called out her order again, noticing something directly behind the ship. She couldn't tell what it was and, apparently, the computers had no idea either. She walked to her command station and brought up all passive data to check them herself, focusing on a spot directly behind them.

"All scopes clear, ma’am," the chief said again after everyone rechecked, but he was interrupted from the secondary optical officer making a call.

"Ma’am, I don't see anything where you requested; however, I am getting activity on those Legion ships. They appear to be burning hard, directly toward us. Estimated a five hundred G burn, relativity is distorting their approach. If the system is correct, we have an intercept E.T.A. in one hour."

"One hour?" she shot up, shocked. As of the last estimate, the ships were still more than seven light hours away—they shouldn't be more than fifty hours out. She grabbed the mic at her station but would not look away from her screen. Something was there, she just knew it. Then it was confirmed.

“Ma’am confirmed fast mover right where you said it would be!" the optical petty officer in charge finally called out.

Without hesitation and without questioning anyone, she flipped the 18 M.C. and made her report. "Con, C.I.C. New contact bearing one-nine-five, zero-degree drift, twenty-two light-seconds out. Estimated impact in fifteen seconds."

John had mozied his way onto the bridge after the proposal from the ship's helmswoman. It was a great idea, something he wished he would have thought of. Being a tactical genius, that should have been his department. Char continued their long competition without him even knowing it, and this time she beat him at his own game. He couldn't help but smile as he sat on his command chair in the command island, she was getting much better at the game. She might even be a better captain than him someday. He almost burned his lips on his coffee, still piping hot straight from the galley, when the 18 M.C. crackled to life, defining the calm silence on the bridge.

"Helm, emergency ventral thrust full burn twenty seconds," he called out, not giving time to sound any maneuvering warning when the junior officer at the helm pushed a few buttons, and the ship thrust into everyone from under them. John was the only one on the bridge not strapped in. He stumbled, trying to strap in quickly before his coffee was flung from the side table, spilling everywhere.

Fifteen seconds was all John needed to hear. That was the sort of emergency decision that any good commander had to make. Life or death, in the blink of an eye. He did not have time to weigh the benefits of remaining in stealth or dodging out of the way, giving away their location. At fifteen-second impact estimation, something was moving at extreme speeds. Someone had thrown an object at them, and for the C.I.C. to not detect it sooner, it was a stealth object. Something along the lines of a railgun dart, it needed to be a solid object that had no reactor, no energy output at all. Nothing natural would have been aimed so precisely at their rear and at such high speeds. If whatever fired that shot knew how to design with such precision, their stealth was blown anyway.

"Con, C.I.C. Legion contacts burning hard toward us, excess of five-hundred Gs. We are having trouble estimating proper E.T.A. to intercept, as general relativity is interfering with the scopes. We are estimating they are burning in excess of point-eight C. Best guess, one hour."

John had to act, he had no time for decision making.

"Helm, emergency burn thrusters all stern full power." He didn't need to do the calculations in his head to know that one hour was a generous estimation. For the sensor systems to just now pick up movement meant the Legion would have had to have started their burn only moments after they had entered the system. This logic confirmed a few things. First, the Legion had faster than light communications somehow. Whatever object fired off those gamma and theta rays they detected must have warned the armada. Secondly, they had the capability to use sensors beyond what relativity would distort. Traveling at 80 percent of the speed of light would prevent the best Federation ships from knowing anything about their surrounding space. The time for decisions and planning was over, it was time to act. Unfortunately, they were still too far from their goal. Char's plan might no longer work.

“General Quarters. Set condition one, all hands Battle-stations," John yelled over the 1 M.C. as he pulled the red claxon lever three times. "Set condition one. Ensign Carr to the Bridge." It would take time for the crew to get back up to speed from silent running. The fusion and F.T.L. reactors needed to run their power-up cycles, while the battery systems started to divert power to the inertia stabilizers and gravity plating systems. During high-g maneuvers, the inertia and gravity subsystems were some of the most vital systems on board, as they allow the crew to survive the crushing maneuvers that would otherwise kill them before ordinance would.

Luckily for Carr, Lieutenant Donovan, the ship's chief engineer, was already warming up the reactors and the inertia subsystems. Gravity was restored while she was in the lift on her way up to the main bridge. Fusion reactors came online the moment she sat in her cockpit chair, grabbing the controls while relieving the junior officer who took the helm in her absence. "How the hell did you fuck up my plan, Cap?" She yelled out over the chaos, adjusting her track and taking control of the thrusters. She started the fire-up process for the main engines to start producing thrust out of the main ports.

"Unknown object passed clean under us, sir!" L.T. Jackson reported faster than the C.I.C. could, flagging the report as accepted, so Ensign Smedly did not have to report in herself.

"Understood." John pulled up the star chart of the system, viewing the location of all the combatants in the system around them, watching the sensor systems come to life as power started to get fed into them and the active systems started broadcasting their pulses. "Nav, plot a course to Hoth and send it to the helm. Helm, immediate execute upon receipt of course. All ahead flank."

Charlene continued to work her controls, monitoring the status output of the reactors, artificial gravity effective level, inertia dampeners’ strength. Regardless of the captain's orders, if she pushed the ship to 15g's without the dampeners ready to handle the load, she could kill the crew. After only a few seconds, her terminal gave her the green light, indicating fusion reactors were powered adequately and the inertia and gravity subsystems were getting full power.

"Helm, aye. Answering all ahead flank," she finally replied.

An audible “Boom” could be heard and felt throughout the ship as the engines dumped out superheated particles of matter, demonstrating Newton's third law of motion. The WarpStar darted towards the frozen ice planet, accelerating at a force fifteen times the natural gravity of Earth. Starting at a velocity equal to about twenty percent the speed of light, the ship would quickly reach almost fifty percent of c before they would reach the planet. Ships’ sensors would begin to struggle in predicting the location of any object in the system soon when it came time to flip the ship for a braking burn. The crew would have to guess at where the enemy was, a tactic that made any commanding officer most nervous.

Char pointed out a flaw in the current captain's plans that could not be foreseen. The X-401 fighters that the WarpStar carried were not equipped with any inertia dampeners or gravity systems. The pilots felt every maneuver and acceleration. "Sir, my pilot will not survive the braking burn at these speeds," she said. "We have to brake now, get us to around point one five of c at the most."

"Well, fuck!" John shouted, staring at his display at the last known estimated location and track of the hostile ships. "Suggestions?" He asked to no one in particular around the bridge. He had a solution in mind himself, but he didn’t want to use it.

"Sir, two minutes maximum until the point of no return safe brake point. My pilot will be crushed at these speeds! He can’t launch anymore."

John glanced around the room, from his pilot to his executive officer, then to tactical and ops. No one had a solution that would prevent the pilot from being killed before he could get into position. "Continue as planned, do not launch your pilot. Calculate me a point of no return with a braking burn at most of twenty G's." Charles gave John a look of horror and began to check the straps on his couch to ensure they were secured.

Warning sounds began ringing off several consoles on the bridge. "Sir, confirmed target lock, we are receiving fire!" Lieutenant Jackson read off the reports, which John ignored as he brought up a control terminal on his console. Inputting a string of code and checking several lines of settings, he sent them to a target called 'Betsy.'

"Betsy, did you receive that?" John spoke into the mic. No one knew who he was talking to. No one except Charlene, who immediately glanced over to John with a look of pure evil. "Excellent, can you execute this plan?" The bridge crew gave glances at their captain, and Char's face grew a deeper red with fiery eyes, targeting thoughts of destruction at her C.O. "Understood. Execute orders."

Charlene's death gaze was interrupted from her control panel sounding a warning of its own. "We are approaching the brake point, sir!" she yelled out.

"Perfect timing. Cut thrust, flip and burn, ensign!"

"Helm, aye, cutting thrust."

"Sir, how are we going to…" Charles asked, but was interrupted by a claxon that rank twice.

"All hands rig for high-G maneuvers," John spoke into the 1 M.C.

Everyone made sure their straps were secured, and the couches were pointed in the proper position for a braking burn. Charlene brought the thrust lever to its neutral position. She began to rotate the ship to point her drives in the direction they were traveling, preparing to fire off more thrust to reduce the speed at a quicker pace than they were accelerating.

"Sir, reading fighter bay doors opening, I can't override it. We have a fighter that has left the bay!" Heidi Watney, the ship's security and tactical officer, reported. Everyone ignored her report. The entire bridge crew was staring at the forward viewports as they completed the rotation needed. The view was horrifying. They saw the Legion ships finally getting into position, at an almost relative stop to their position. Matching course and speed, the Legion armada had managed to close a seven-light-hour gap, a trip that would have taken just over a day, in just over eight hours of actual time, presenting a level of technology only possible in science fiction.

"Incoming fire!" Heidi reported.

"Char!!" John shouted, subliminally asking her to kick it up a notch in her maneuver.

"Punching it now!" she shouted, right after setting the speed limiter to 20g's and pushing the thrust lever all the way forward.

The rectangular drive nozzles flexed again as superheated gas exited all five units, reversing the third law of motion, forcing a reduction in speed greater than they had accelerated. The Legion ships almost immediately flew past them on the viewer—they did not perform the same brake burn, and their velocity was suddenly far higher than that of the WarpStar's. The force hit every crew member at once, pushing against them at five times the force of Earth's gravity.

The burn only lasted for a few moments, not long enough to create any lasting damage to anyone, but longer than anyone would care to admit for comfort level. "Approaching safe velocity, cutting thrust," Char shouted as she pulled the lever back, setting it to neutral. She selected the rotate switch on the thruster control panel, instructing the system to fire the bow and stern side thrusters to fire at opposite when the helm moved the yolk to each side, creating rotation on the ship instead of sideways motion. As the ship rotated, the pure white planet came into view, almost taking up the entire view screen as Char positioned the planet directly under them.

"It's beautiful!" Heidi said, breaking military discipline. No one countermanded, as everyone stared at the beauty in awe. An alien world, filled with mountains of ice and tundra.

"Con, C.I.C. Legion ships are braking hard to attempt a re-intercept." Again, no one responded to the report. John just gripped his seat, waiting to test yet another ability the prototype starship was designed for. And if his plan worked, they wouldn't have to worry about Legion ships finding them.

"All hands, rig for planetary entry," John ordered over the 1 M.C., instructing everyone on board to prepare themselves and their stations to enter the atmosphere of a planet. All free tools and objects were to be stowed away, the galley would secure all food and dishes, and every single person would strap into a crash couch wherever they may be. Gravity systems would begin to shut off, as they would interfere with the planet’s natural gravity and short out the subsystems.

The WarpStar is the only starship in the Federation's fleet that is designed with the capability to enter a planet’s atmosphere, maneuver, and land. Traditionally, Corvettes and hoppers were the only ships larger than construction tugs that had interplanetary capabilities. Anything larger was not designed for the aerodynamics of atmosphere flight and could not compensate for the planet's natural gravity.

"Entering Atmo!" Charlene yelled as the ship began to shake, turning off the inertia stabilizers and gravity systems, as the gravity of the planet would disrupt the artificial gravity systems.

"Atmosphere entry detected." The Terrain Avoidance and Warning System spoke up on the speakers in the manual helm cockpit, signaling the ship had started to enter the boundaries of the planet. The WarpStar had begun to experience violent turbulence as the gravity subsystems were offline, shaking harder as each second passed. The effect could also be seen out of the viewports, as the friction created a chaotic hell on the exterior of the ship and the black void of space was slowly replaced by fiery orange and red hues.

The ship counted its violent descent as it created a giant fireball in the sky of the barn ice world. The only damage that was inflicted during the descent was a few bruises and headaches on the crew, as the ship was coated with heat and friction-resistant coating that serves multiple uses. Not only does it completely mitigate the effects of a planetary entry, but it also helps reduce some damage that energy or particle weapons would inflict. The catch is a big gamble. If any energy bled through the shields during a battle and managed to cut through some of the coatings, the crew would not know. There would be no way to tell without performing an exterior inspection. As shields offer zero protection against the friction of an atmosphere, landing on a planet after a battle is a life-or-death risk.

Just two minutes is all it took for the chaos to end. Charlene watched the speed indicator rapidly decrease, then noticed as the speed of the descent gradually slowed itself. The orange hue started to slowly be replaced by the blue hue of the sky. "Atmo entry completed!" Charlene reported to the room as she adjusted her controls for proper flight inside the limits of a planet. Her lips stretched from ear to ear as she took in the moment—she was the first human to fly a starship on a planet!

John wasted no time in continuing his orders, knowing she was having some fun, but wanting her to not be distracted. "Excellent work, ensign, now take us to the spot we discovered."

"Con, C.I.C. Opticals and thermals are confirming a second fireball directly behind us. By the diameter, I would guess we have a cruiser following us," Jennifer reported over the 15 MC.

John reiterated the urgency of the situation. "Char, we're going to have company and fast!"

"Scratch that," Jennifer's voice was heard over the 15 M.C. as John noticed she had not closed the circuit. "Now seeing fifteen. Thirty. Eighty-seven. No, three hundred and … No, sir, I believe the ship is breaking up, it did not survive planetary entry."

John and Charles shard a look of surprise at each other, then laughter erupted between the two men as the tension eased. Soon everyone on the bridge except Char was enjoying on the good luck they had stumbled upon.

Char ignored the cheering, taking in the sights around her and enjoying flying the Destroyer over icy and snow-covered mountains. She had been on alien worlds before—Orion, Mars, and she even did some survival training on an asteroid in Sirius. She was still the first pilot to fly a ship more larger than a hopper inside an atmosphere. She let the bridge crew savor their minor victory, hers was just around the corner. She located her spot—a small cavern tucked inside a valley of a mountain range, just large enough to fit the WarpStar inside, covering three sides of the ship. The cavern was surrounded by lead and uranium, blocking any sort of signals and sensor data in and out. It was discovered during a planetary survey five years ago and flagged for possible Republic outposts. They were using it for a different reason now.