<continued from Part V>
* * *
181 Malique, the Greater Jarao Sector, March 25, 2170
Manazya Joangu was nineteen Earth-years of age, although, through the
oddities of relativity, she had barely aged over the past year. The
artificial gravity generators, the null-gee environs, and the miracle of
superluminal flight had preserved her youth--despite her long-lived
Zentraedi heritage--to an almost seven percent factor. Prior to the
recession to lower levels of superluminal flight, space-folding had involved
an incredulous degree of time dilation in respect to Common Reference (the
uncanny nuisance of relativity); posing several problems that were only
beginning to be sorted out by 2060--when Earth lost its capacity to ever
execute a fold beyond the practical velocity of fifty-thousand cee.
Spacefold involved the instantane-ous transition from realspace into the
upper "third" region of hyperspace, refered to commonly as tran-swarp space
or even more so as slipspace. Warps operated in the second inferior region,
known com-monly as subspace or warpspace and defined as the hyperspace
region that bordered the line of causality.
Folds further demonstrated the distinction between neural function rates
and metabolic rates. During a fold, the neural effects of superluminal
flight were still experienced through time dilation, however, meta-bolic
effects were much more widespread. Somehow, the tachyons that continued to
energize against the warp field that mediated a vessel through hyperspace
were able to effect a preservation, almost regenera-tive process on the
body. The neural systems of organisms, however, which engaged in
bioenergetic proc-esses that were unique to its cells and its cells alone,
experienced a sort of backwash in time-dilation--they were accelerated to
register sensory input and translate it much more efficiently than during a
spacefold. Neural functions suffered slight disorientation for a few
seconds following the warp jump, compared to the nearly ten minutes required
to recover from the effects of a pre-Severance spacefold. Soon afterwards,
both neural and metabolic rates would equalize, giving the impression of
increased longetivity as memory capacity had been accelerated to calibrate
for the effects of time dilation and suffered no real dilation. Metabolic
rates were continually affected proportionally to the dilation involved. As
far as Manazya was concerned, however, such pensiveness on the subject of
artificial longetivity was irrelevent--as a Zen-traedi, her physical make-up
was genetically predisposed to a two century-plus lifespan. Instead, the
lav-ender-mane, solidly-built Academy undergraduate zipped up her flight
uniform. The vac-suit snugged comfortably against her body, pressing her
curvaceous form into statue-perfect form. Manazya Joangu sighed vainly as
she shut the locker, threw her flight helmet under her arm, and hastily made
her way towards the flight deck.
Ninety-five light-minutes beyond 181 Malique's final planetary orbit, a
single vessel dropped out of warp, flanked by two smaller twenty-men
corvettes; her chock-full mecha bays and armories were pre-pared to open at
a moments notice. When the captain ordered the gravity drive to idle, the
destroyer es-cort settled at base velocity (relative to the system's star)
of point-zero-zero-two of lightspeed. The sump of the impeller's natural
inertial compensator shallowed as the power cut to a mere fraction of the
maxi-mum, leaving only enough acceleration for minor course changes.
Pitch black and illuminated only by its own running lights, the Callant
II-class Garfish destroyer-escort boasted a sleeker, feminine design than
predecessor Katana-class DEs. Measuring about fifty-nine meters longer than
the previous century's Katana, the Garfish II's internal improvements also
overshadowed the relatively aboriginal technology at the time. With
sublight gravity distortion drive--the grav-impeller--clearly demonstrated a
fifty-eight percent efficiency advantage over vessels of comparative
displacement mounting similar propulsion systems. This particular DE's
markings indicated her affiliation with De-stroyer Squadron 219, and her
christianed title, the UCSS Ulyanov, ran across the hull at the water-line.
Although a Navy ship, assigned to a Navy picket, the Ulyanov--like the rest
of her DE sisters in DesRon 219--also carried a Marine complement. In this
case, the UPDF Marine Corps made up the entire aero-space and planetary
operations component of the picket--and for good reason, too.
After all, 181 Malique belonged to the the United Planetary Defense
Force Marine Corps. Everyday, the fighter and attack squadrons of the 7th
Marine Air Wing enthusiastically engaged in their morning rituals; whether
in the orbital berths of Malique's inner system or in the cold wastes of
deep space, the 7th MAW drilled regardless--period. Five hours from their
home base on Malique IV, the Garfish and her two Horizont escorts opened
their bays, leaving the barn door open for the dozens of Marine VTs standing
by inside. Each Marine onboard embodied the corps d'esprit of the ASF;
after all, the Marine Corps alone refused to succumb to the idea of elite
units where it could boast that the entire outfit was the best of the best.
Neither Navy nor Army personnel willingly debated that; the Marines,
throughout their history on hun-dreds of worlds--through thousands of
incarnations--represented the supreme unification of the armed forces'
ideals. In the early years of the 21st century, the infantry division of
the recently incorporated United Nations First Marine Expeditionary Force
(Space and Planetary)--stationed on Macross Island to guard Earth's first
alien asset--valiantly held Starship Hill against a Neasianist invasion
force; holding out until regular UNDF reinforcements could arrive. The cost
in lives included over two-thirds of the divi-sion's battalions--a total
loss of eight-thousand seven-hundred men and women. Similar situations rise
up from Mutan and Eridani military lore; the Corron Empire often appointed
the bold and courageous of their assault ground forces to their equivalent
of sainthood--more often than not, posthumously. For many of the various
space-faring star-states within the Confederation, the Marines were the
elite ground forces within their respective military structures.
Unlike the other service-branches, the Marine Corps could trace their
history all the way back across its Terran Lineage to before the AEF; it was
first incepted by the United Earth Government in 2001. After-all,
two-thirds of the Corps consisted of Terran troops, and Terra's own Earth
Defense Marine Corps often worked as incorporate forces within their ASF
counterpart. The First UPDF Marine Expeditionary Force, consisted of
three-fourths of Earth's United Nations Marine Corps for the first twenty
years after its con-ception. Ultimately, its through Terran lineage that
the Marines claimed a great deal of their traditions and code of honor. The
"Earthling" ability and battlefield code of honor had been tested and proven
through three Robotech Wars and four interstellar bloodbaths with the Corron
Empire, and the respect the Corps drew from both the people and the rank and
file of other services only continued to increase. In the Marines, no
excuses for inefficency and incompetence existed; only the constant drilling
of the operational and logistics ends of the outfit ensured a smoothly
operating machine of men and equipment. That went for aviators,
groundpounders, and spacers alike.
"Get a move on!" the shouts from and to ground crew and pilots went out.
The fold's effects rapidly receded and hangar activity boosted to full
swing. Midshipman Lieutenant Commander Manazya zipped up her flight uniform
and tossed her helmet, emblazoned in huge scarlet letters with the title
"Jade," to her canopy attendent. This wouldn't be the first time she had
flown with the Marines. With most of the Navy holding stand-off positions
along the Buffer Zone, and patrolling the region for Chorymi raiders, the
Academy's premier cadets were introduced to aviation posts within the Marine
Corps. To fit into the line of command, all cadets and officer candidates
undertaking service internship received a temporary com-mission to Ensign
2nd class--the naval equivalent to a Temporary Third Lieutenant and the
lowest possible grade occupied by a commissioned officer.
Color-coded catsmen rushed into the lower launching decks of the A-level
hangar, readying the plasma-induction launch units for a rapid deployment.
The Garfish's current compliment wasn't par-ticularly large, only sixteen
Veritechs and three AWACS/ELINT "Goonies." One was from the 245th
Marines-AC--First Marine Action Force: the Veritech Fighter Attack Squadron
"Mackerals"--detached to Fifth Tactical Veritech Squadron "Tartars" for the
next three years. The second consisted of elements of the Navy Veritech
Fighter Squadron Two-Three--"Firebricket"--a permanent member of the 5th
Wing/2nd Strategical Veritech Squadron "Mongols." Both answered to the
First Tactical Corps, though for the former it was only a temporary
arrangement; Marines were often shuffled to appropiate Task Groups (and,
consequently, different command structures) due to a variety of situations.
Manazya her-alded from the Mars Base Gloval Navy Academy and was attached to
the latter squadron.
"Have fun, lieutenant. It's just like a game of solitaire; no one about
and very little to do," the flight leader--a tall, lieutenant commander of
African-American heritage--offer his fist for a swift "pound," a North
American gesture she had learned adequately during her years on Eden. "Just
fly around, ignore the scuttlebutt, and slap yourself in the face if you
start to fall asleep. It's gonna be a long haul."
Manazya smiled turned for her VT. One of the crew warming up the
cockpit system tossed her a small diskette package from the table near the
rear of her VT, which she strapped firmly into one of her uni-form's utility
pockets. Climbing into the reclined interior, she removed the four
crystal-diskettes and in-serted them into respective slots next to her mecha
configuration control board. By simply taking hold of the sidesticks, her
VF-2S Ultra-Valkyrie's internal systems came to life. On her screen, the
familiar ACS bootup logo flashed for about two or three minutes as the
ARRC-200d1 Combat Computer System com-pleted its software bootup. Manazya
quickly punched her five-digit/three-letter flight code. For conven-ience
Her green-hair, inherited from her Zentraedi parents, was rolled tight into
a bun as she strapped on the duck-billed systems-helmet. Plugging into her
cockpit's main computer, the diodes within the hel-met's transparency lit
up, revealing complimentary information to that of the full canopy head's up
dis-play. Her CVR-9 flexisuit allowed her to sychronize in her various
suit-embedded systems, including a wrist-communicator and bio-monitor. All
this was via the strong hyperoptic data link through her helmet. Manazya
nearly felt like she was one with her fighter.
She turned on her tac-net and switched off to a direct transit route to
the Control room. The face of the Ulyanov CIC's chief defense controller,
a Marine Corps First Lieutenant--Kanuka McIntyre, appeared on the OLCD
right-hand screen, her permanent glare notwithstanding.
"Flights Hammerfist Romeo and Hammerfist Juliet, this is
Delta-Charlie-Mike. Your signal is five-by-five. Continue to points Wyvern
and Mystic, standard patrol formation. ETA, first waypoint: one-hour,
forty-five minutes."
"Roger that, Control," her flight commander replied over the tac-net.
Then switching to flight-band only, he began to spout off launching orders.
"All right. I want a tight, Double-Gee with Romeo Two, Five, and Eight on
Three's ass. Six, you awake?"
Manazya--flying as "Romeo Six"--acknowledged, "Sir, ordnance report.
Arming complete."
"Got that, Control?"
"Loud and Clear, Romeo One," the defense controller replied. "You have
three hours, operational time. Now hold on, we're affixing weapons packs
Code Niner-Oh-Niner-Mark-Tango."
The two main turbines on the VT seemed to hoist up, anglinged downard
thirty five degrees. In pretty much the same way the older generation
Valkyries transformed, the Ultra-Valkyries tail control surfaces folded
downward as most of the posterior fusealage flipped foward, revealing the
Guardian-mode's thruster unit. Automated drive units slipped on the turbine
armor/weapon packs as a massive, horseshoe shaped affixture descended on the
dorsel fusealage, affixing the main FAST pack to the top of the VT. The
Valkyrie immediately emitted foreboding aura; a heavily armed implement of war.
Five hours total, Manazya groaned in recognition of the time-length for
this flight. Normally, a VT flight from Phobos launch point would last
about an hour to two hours of flight time, including strafing runs on the
moon and eventually and atmospheric descent. Even more exciting was earning
her para-trooping wings; a test only satisfied by leaping off of the Mars
Equatorial Tower at the five-hundred mile mark.
Once the FAST-pack was stablilized and jacked into the combat system,
the three technicians responsi-ble for prepping her bird quietly shut the
canopy, removing extraneous equipment and fixtures from the Valkyrie's
hardpoints and making way for the mobile launching units.
The four levels of fighter bays opened up to loose the two Veritech
flights. Affixed on electroplasmic catapults, Manazya felt not even a
slight jerk as the catapulted heaved her Veritech into the vacuum of space.
Every last Veritech on deck was hurtled from its bay like a bullet out of a
muzzle. Within mo-ments, the Ultra-Valk's engines accelerated her to
seventeen gees, the inertial compensators sparing her from the tremendous
forces throttling her forward. At the ten second mark, the engine burn cut
out, pre-serving valuable reaction mass for local maneuvering; the
Ultra-Valks began to form up in a Flat Triangle formation.
Romeo Six, equipped with a specialized sensor palette, situated where
the main autocannon ought to be, trailed Five and formed the eight o'clock
vertex; this position allowed her the greatest operational cover-age of the
situation without making her terribly vulnerable to tactical surprise. To
further confuse any untoward visitor, Romeo Seven, who formed the four
o'clock vertice, and Romeo Five were equipped with radio beacons that
intermittently flashed--drawing attention away from Manazya's vulnerable craft.
"All right, people," Romeo One blared over the tac-net. "Keep a tight
formation. We're go for Way-point One grav-boost in ten seconds. Romeo
Five, commence the count-down."
"Roger, Romeo One," Five replied. "G-minus ten seconds, G-minus nine
seconds..."
As the countdown continued, Manazya gazed blankly out of the canopy.
The emptiness--the cold, dark vacuum beyond--remained so unwaveringly still.
Although the reaction-mass burn had cut out, the fric-tionless void
permitted the flight of Veritechs to glide freely along their current
vector. Only minute changes made by the attitude adjusters and variable
thrusters situated in various strategic locations on each Veritech's
fusealage did anything to deviate their present course. Of course, the
outside void would remain unmoving. As much as she hated thinking about it,
relativity pretty much considered their present velocity, in absolute terms,
far closer to the lowest motion limit than highest--the "speed" of
causality. Hell, the Ultra-Valk could easily accelerate to into orbit from
within an atmosphere, assuming it started off on jets and conserved its
reaction-mass for the final leg. Still, with reaction drives--even with the
im-proved ion-fusion powerplant, an pulse-plasma primary propulsion system,
and exhaust "gravitic energiz-ers"--and a maximum delta-v of little over
seven-point-five kilometers per second, a small craft like Manazya's fighter
had little or no chance of getting anywhere terribly fast. The practice
staging area lay nearly two standard lunar units (four-hundred thousand
klicks) beyond her maximum operating range. The solution, Manazya noted,
came in the form of the special dual-prong assembly looming over her head,
visible as a pair of distending, corpulent javelins on either side of the
canopy.
Manazya gazed at the weapons extensions on the forefront of the pack's
starboard protrusion, quickly testing the bay-ports before Romeo Five hit
"G-minus one....mark!" Immediately, her thumb flipped open the safe-guard
on her left-side throttle stick. Depressing the naked, red button-key,
Manazya felt the slightest disconcertion as the inertial compensators kicked
in. Only the low hum of her pod's drive warned her of the accelerations she
had just attained; the small power-plant the "booster" pack's had just
accelerated her at close to fifty gees.
The FAST booster pack maintained its acronymic meaning since its
functional conception for United States Air Force--two hundred years ago.
However, this particular arrangement--the
Charlie-Lima-Victor-Zero-Three-Zero-Lima-Romeo-Alpha (the CLV-030-LRA) Main
Veritech Armor Assembly--no longer mounted additional reaction boosters.
Instead, modern strike-craft mounted packs with small gravitic-impellers,
designed for long-range fighter operations. Certain FAST Packs,
particularly the CLV-044 series, were dedicated drive units--primarily for
the use of recon and ELINT craft. The -WRA variant of the Forty-Four class
pack also mounted a small Kingspin hyperspace translation module. While a
suitably modified fighter mounting a CLV-044-WRA could execute a local,
short-range fold (with a maximum range of just under three light-minutes),
the craft suffered a decisive lack of additional armor. Even more so, the
power drain of a warp pack allowed only for four hyper-jumps between
powerplant re-furbishment.
To the chagrin of the Confederation military-industrial complex, it
remained a known fact that the idea had been borrowed from the Corron;
although the Hwi-zhemal'orra "borrowed" the design concept of an
externally-mounted booster from the Terran aerospace philosophy. Still, the
innovativeness of Corron R&D reared itself in that unusual manner (unusual
considering that the Corron space-faring civilization ranked humanity's
existance as a sentient species by nearly one million years, yet their
tech-base had not even broken into gravitics until less than twenty-thousand
years ago). However, employing gravity drives--albeit with severely limited
power capacitance--instead of reaction-mass and fuel opened a whole new
world of small craft operational doctrine.
As the young Zentraedi midshipman remembered from her Basic Tactical and
Strategical History course, small craft operations had always been limited
to planetary assaults--after the orbitals had been secured. In fact, the
concept of the space carrier, a CV for extra-atmospheric warfare, was
primarily an accidental offshoot of battle-line warships that shuttled small
craft from planet to planet; a concept em-braced by nearly three-hundred
space-faring cultures within the Confederation. Before Manazya's ances-tors
educated Terrans in the realities of interplanetary warfare, the old Earth
United Nations Defense Force maintained a space navy that the
carrier-concept dominated absolutely. The fact that carriers had played
such a large role in the navies of Earth's last superpowers and the
development of light, transat-mospheric aerospace craft had forced Earth
into an unholy marriage with the tool; a technically "ineffective" primary
weapon that the Terrans had managed to turn to their advantage.
The primary problem with fighters and other small craft was their
infinitessimally small range. As gravitic propulsion in an era of
long-range missiles, particle beam weapons, and fusion-pumped lasers gave
new credence to the space navy's battle-line, the same advancements spelled
doom for light, in-fighting mecha and their carriers as naval weapons.
Carriers, mounting no integral armament of any se-rious capability, found
that their only defense and offensive weapon, the space fighter and attack
craft/mecha, lacked the range and the effectiveness of the tactical weapons
mounted on a real battle-line naval vessel. The old Earth REF demonstrated
this aptly as they introduced the mollusk Invid's carrier-oriented Navy to
the striking firepower of the battle-line. The Tirolians and the Zentraedi
had mastered an entire Quadrant with their stupendous warships; the
dreadnoughts and battleships of a Zentraedi wall, as well as the lighter
vessels of the screen, handled the space end of things. The ships were
built large enough to hold huge quantities of mecha, ready to deliver
against any enemy mecha formation both in space and dirt side. With the
range of the farthest-reaching of a battle-line's armament over ten thousand
times the range of a large, reaction-drive Light Attack Craft, the unarmed
carrier could never hope to an-swer functionally.
Still, the most frustrating aspect of this sad story lied in a single
hypothesis: if a carrier that could deiver its fighters OUTSIDE of the range
of a battle-line; then carrier warfare could have a significant, positive
effect on the orbital battlefield. The Confederation's R&D organs around
the latter half of the 21st century had recognized the potential of
refitting small craft with the new, miniaturized gravitic drives debuting
during that time. However, the drive philosophy was for an internal
arrangement, which made for a tremendous sacrifice in both avionics,
sensors, and weapons. Fighters mounting the new, massive armament, were
tremendously large and bulky, as small craft still rely on reaction mass for
local maneu-vering--at that point, no shortcuts past inertial mass and
related properties exist. However, the Corron modified several of their
non-transformable fighters--upon acquiring the concept of the modular,
detach-able engine mount from the Confederation--to support small gravitic
drives within nacelle-like structure under each wing. The simple fact of
the matter was the Confederation had never even considered the possibility,
and the obvious solution stung of humiliation once the UPDF Navy discovered
that the Hwi-zhemal'orra were deploying strike-craft and fighters in
battle-line engagements. Immediately, the Con-federation's military (and
civilian liner corporations) seized the idea and ran with it. The result: a
FAST pack that mounted both the impeller and the inertial compensator--even
small, thanks to a superior Con-federation tech-base--and a range increased
over ten thousand percent. With the new impeller drive, the Ultra-Valkyrie
could effectively make a trip from Earth to Mars--alone. Whereas the
maximum attack acceleration Manazya's bird cut off at about fifteen gees,
the gravity drive alone could accelerate a fighter up to two-hundred gees.
Not enough to outrun any real naval vessel mounting a gravity drive, but
enough to put their operating range beyond that of a missile and beam
offensive envelope. The strike craft and the carrier, for the first time,
had become a viable weapon of space warfare.
In addition to its function as a long-range "booster," the FAST pack
also had the capability to support a number of ordnance loads, including
Hammerhead-MX-IV guided rockets, Diamondback and Silver short-range
missiles, M0D-24d02 "Mods" five-missile SMRM pods, Firestorm long range
anti-ship mis-siles, and a variety of other fittings; not to mention five
slave ordnance pods that could be tractored within her gravitic drive's
acceleration wake. For this current Shoot-Ex (Shooting Excercise), she was
merely outfitted with Stiletto-9 AFSRSAF--Anti-Fighter (Short-Range)
Shoot-and-Forget missiles. Additionally, the left pod of the pack
assortment was outfitted with a thirty-five millimeter light mass-driver
cannon, capable of firing up to 40 rounds per minutes. Although the current
outfit parameters only afforded her fifteen the expensive, ribilium-coated
energizable projectiles. With such an adaptability to modern weap-ons
systems, the Ultra-Valkyrie still retained its frontline value even in the
face of its newer, more pow-erful descendents.
Manazya broke off from her train of thought and focused on the
ever-imperative present. Fifteen min-utes ago, the flight disengaged their
gravity drives and proceeded along their current vector; coasting at
approximately five-hundred and seventy kilometers per second. The lone
midshipman switched her re-ceiver to wideband neutrino frequencies, setting
the reception to pick-up ship-to-shore and ship-to-ship transmissions.
After nearly an hour into the patrol's first leg, the scuttlebutt
finally began..
"It looks quiet enough," Romeo Seven said to himself. The Oort cloud
region they were entering por-trayed eerily distinctive lines of debris and
dust, and an occassional signifigantly large piece of cometary matter. "I
mean, we're lightyears from anything anyway, so what could happen?"
"Bull. I heard a troopcarrier got her ass stuck out here for three
days. I think they it was Thirty-Seven?"
"I heard that, too," Romeo Four spoke up. "It was right in that gas
cloud up ahead. Whoever it was, they took one hell of a whuppin' and then
cut out. I haven't talked to any from Thirty-Seven, but I wouldn't doubt
it. Damn pirates, all balls and no brains."
"Man, it's all dead space" another voice rose up; harsh, yet lacking
unwavering confidence. Manazya swallowed hard.
"Ain't nothing out here," Romeo Three continued. Naturally, Ensign
Midshipman Joangu wasn't quite sure; still, she tried to suck in her
anxiety--concentrating on anything but the dark void that enveloped her
canopy. The other flight consisted mostly of midshipmen like herself.
However, Manazya relished the privilege to spend the rest of the day with
the slightly less green officers of the VFMA-299 Firebricket Squadron. And
with a Shoot-Ex prepared for the second leg of the BARCAP practice run, they
had nothing to worry about.
"C'mon guys," the junior grade Lieutenant flying Romeo Seven--Manazya
had formed her Veritech on his low, seven-thirty flank--genuinely pleaded.
"I've got enough to worry about than some spook Pariah squadron busting out
over our heads."
"Whattsa matter, Nalevsky?" Romeo Five taunted. "You ain't getting cold
feet now, are ya'?"
"No...it's just that," Nalvesky stuttered. "What if it is true? I
mean, we should--"
"Hey back there," Romeo One interrupted; a sonorous, authoritative
rumble swelling in his throat. "Keep the tac-net clean and the scuttlebutt
in the lounge. That kinda talk won't do anyone a bit of good out here.
Six? What do you see?"
"Clear, clean and naked," Manazya responded. "We'll be passing through
as small dust cloud at four-seven-seven-echo in five minutes, Romeo One."
"ETA?"
"Two hours, forty-seven minutes."
"Aw hell," Romeo Two snorted. "Another long boring run."
"Quiet," Romeo One retained a nominal measure of amicability in his
tone. "Distance from waypoint one?"
"We're at....."
"Six? Romeo Six? Jade? Hey, Manazya!"
?
She suddenly froze, as if something cold had just swept passed across
her soul.
"Sir, we're five-zero-eight-ten klicks from first waypoint," she
immediately requested a datapack recall from the AWACS birds flying point
towards their west star-relative. "AWACS-Greenclan recommends a detour; is
as follows. 'Come about to one-nine-nine mark three-three; advises we avoid
the gaseous col-lective.' "
"The dust cloud? Damn babies," Romeo One laughed hoarsely.
"Recommendation duly noted. Flight commander opts to ignore. Maintain course."
"Sir, the recommendation is being recognized and heeded by--"
"Don't worry about it, Six."
"Copy that, Romeo One."
"Very good," then switching to his OLCD display. "Romeo Three, take
your group and spread into V-stack formation parallel to present position.
I want all our asses covered going into this cloud, even though its most
likely nothing."
The cold...The feeling rushed through her again, this time provoking a
shivering chill. "Romeo One, this is Romeo Six. I'd advise caution, Romeo
One."
"Really, Six?" Romeo flashed off tac-net and onto her left OLCD screen.
"What's up?"
"I don't know, Sir. I just have a cold feeling about this place."
"You Zentraedi worry too much. We're lightyears from the nearest
star--of course its a bit chilly. In-tersteller patrols are enough to spark
any anxiety. You'll get used to it."
Manazya, "Jade," wanted to protest, but decided against it, and
continued to monitor their flight status. She called up AWACS-Greeneyes.
The data transmission didn't log.
She tried once again, and continued to fail to connect to the AWACS
guidance systems. Checking her codes briefly, she tried one more time, and
still failed to break in.
"Commander, I've lost contact with Greeneyes. Trying Greenclan."
No response.
"No response," she repeated outloud. "Sir, I have no AWACS contact.
Please advise, over."
"What was that Jade? Confirm."
"Romeo One," Manazya breathed in. "I have tried to call up both of our
seeing eyes and I can't raise either of them. Please advise."
The commmander paused for a few moments before switching to wideband
tac-net. "Romeo-Three? Hey, Romeo Three?"
"Damn," Romeo One finally gave up. "Homeplate, this is Flight
Romeo-Green. Request positions of AWACS-Greenclan,--Greeneyes, and
Romeo-Bravo detach. Over."
"Yes, commander. We read you," a small, alien-toned voice of feminine
quality replied. "We have also lost contact with our birds. The Hammerfist
seems to also suffering heavy interference."
"Interference?"
"We're not sure, commander, but there hasn't been a single indication
of Corron activity anywhere in this sector. Captain Leharvey is mandating
the continuation of patrol patterns."
"Who am I speaking, too?" Romeo One gritted his teeth.
"He's my new victim, Spaceman Recruit Saki Tokamura, Harb," the Defense
Controller shoved her way on screen, pushing her relief aside. "We don't
know what's happening out their, but the Hammerfist--"
"Is also missing," Romeo One continued. "Yes we--"
Romeo Six spotted it, but it was Romeo Two who first spoke up.
"Sir! Look out!"
But it was two late. Part of a small short-range missile barrage
penetrated the weak outer coating of the unshielded fighter, Romeo One
disappearing into a blossom of exploding hydrogen reserves and shrapnel.
More enemy missiles struck Romeo Four and Three. Three managed to escape
with half his rear fuselage torn in half, and leaving enough circuitry
intact to jettison the forward life-support module. "What the HELL is going
on here?"
"Bandit! Bandit!"
"I've got no visual confirmation! Where the hell is Three?"
Manazya jinked past any potential gun turrets that might be aimed on her
six, burning out of formation just as a second missile barrage struck Four
and Five. "Knapsack! Four and Five are down! I can't con-firm the
bandit's position!" They're dying. My whole team! They're being wiped out!
She searched her screen desperately for any sign of Three or Five, the other
two cadets on this flight. Only debris stumbled into the path of her
neutrino-pulse sensors as she advanced aimlessly through the blackness,
occassionally squeezing off close range, kinetic fire at the spectre that
simply wasn't there.
Lasers puncuated space's Cimmerian character, flashing across the black
background like the glowing streams of light they were.
"Going to Battloid!" Manazya's Ultra-Valkyrie barrel-rolled away from
the last missile barrage, where Romeo Three's debris was circling around the
gravitational fluxae. Through a series of changes infor-mally dubbed
mechamorphosis, the Veritech became a fourteen-meter gigantic mechanical
humanoid. Bringing her GU-23 autocannon to bear, Manazya affixed it's
monomolecular bayonet as it's metallic sheen readily reflected the brief
pinpricks of starlight that surrounded her.
"Romeo Six!" Knapsack, Romeo Two, came live onto the tac-net. "As soon
as you can, I want you to make a run back for the Ulyanov. Hammerfist is
point-zero-six from our position; posted a distress call to--look out!"
Manazya reacted even more quickly than the lieutenant's warning. Three
laser bolts raced past her and nearly grazed Romeo Two as well. Knapsack
quickly recovered and went to Battloid mode, sticking to Manazya's flank
like a fly on the wall. "They musta laid some thermo-chaff before we got
here. Don't rely on your high-band sensors. Switch to ELINT-low systems
and activate all ECM. Fire at anything that moves--and not me!"
"Yes Sir," Manazya remained calm, despite the near annihilation of her
entire squadron. Debris was floating slowly by, she noticed between heavy
breaths. She loosened her helmet strap and gripped both sidesticks
tightly...waiting. The back-lit green screen, her old style luminal based
radar, remained empty without so much as a disturbance outside....
It flucuated...
"They're cloaked," Romeo Two whispered over the remains of the tac-net.
"And that's thermo-chaff out there. No message gets in or out."
"And if homeplate--"
"Homeplate can't hear us, and they've probably set up mirrors to prevent
the luminal and superluminal explosive signatures from reaching visual and
mechanical sensors. We're alone, kid."
"Be advised. Enemy appears superior. Quality, unknown. Quantity,
unknown," she knew both of her computers were assessing the situation
correctly. The Veritech computer compensated for the shortcom-ings of the
slow, organic mind of the living being, allowing for the impredicatability
and the coordinative power of intelligence to easily interface with the
means to execute logical and illogical decisions in a flexible yet efficient
manner. The VT computer, even in an aging VF-2S, was an amazing feet in
multi-tronics. Manazya hoped that the rumors of technology being on the
Confederation's side--the propaganda spread throughout every war coverage
news service in the organization--were ultimately true.
Quiet.
"Where the hell is he?" Knapsack broke the tense silence. "Cadet. On
my count, go to Fighter mode and get ready to get the hell outta here."
"Sir? You require assistence. Probab--"
"Cadet, that was not a suggestion, nor a request for recommendations.
That was a no-question order. You do know what a no-question order is? Right?"
Manazya silently conceded. "I'm going to count to three," the
lieutenant continued. "Then you turn tail and run. Overboost the hell
outta here. I'll cover you, but--just get the hell outta here, got it?"
"Yes, Sir."
Quiet...
"One..."
Too quiet.
"Two.....THREE!!!" The reversion to fighter mode was as quick as a
single thought--her helmet neural sensors dedicated to adjusting
mechamorphing procedures to fine-tune her manual controls. As soon as the
fighter mode was achieved, neural sensors went back off line, and Manazya
thrusted her throttle lever full ahead. Her engines glowed bright white as
she literally jumped passed Mach One; the sudden shift nearly knocking the
wind out of her.
"Romeo Two! I'm away! How's my tail look?"
Quiet...
"Romeo Two?" Still, no answer.
She didn't call a third time, switching completely off tac-net as her
fighter "afterburned" all the way back home. Her radar showed no signs of
pursuit or any bandits in the area.
Manazya stared forward and let a deep recess in her soul take the
painful brunt of the horror the cosmos had dealt her.
* * *
+-----------------+-<The Badass Reverend of Funk Prez>---+
| Presley H. | Political Science / Computer Science |
| Cannady II | and Electrical Engineering Undergrad |
|<revprez@mit.edu>| at the Mass. Institute of Technology |
+-----------------+-<Anime Manga Development Group>------+
+ Author of Liars and Dreamers, a Robotech fanfic +
+-------<http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/1731/index.html>-+
| MIDN 4/c A-2-2 SQD, MIT-Harvard-Tufts NROTC Battalion |
|_|"The art of war is of vital importance to the state"|_|