Angel of Death
A/N, When doing research into the Katana class, I realized that the inhabited planet of the Chantilly System is named Vespasian (Merely spelled with a second E) so I named the planet Augustus.
Rebecca Suggins held the pad in her hand as she entered Pri-fly. There was what was called a 'fighter jock' mentality from 2000 plus years ago, back when mankind was in just one system, and 'carriers' meant wet navy ships. When Admiral Dame Honor Harrington had recreated that mentality for space combat, it had been renamed the 'LAC jock' mentality. As that ancient believed, a 'proper fighter jock' had two 'big brass ones'. Meaning something no woman would posses.
But enough Manticoran women had proven to have had two 'big brass ones' that the rules had changed, and she had been assumed to have 'them' even if nature had never gifted her with the genitalia.
As commander of 'Composite Squadron 1175', Suggins had assumed her role with aplomb. She had proven efficient in her new role as a detached squadron commander. Pri-fly was a series of comfortable lounge chairs where her pilots sat, ready to accept her orders.
She faced her team, bringing up the next simulation. "Listen up, please. It's simulation time again, and this time we're drilling with our resident A-Tac instead of Tac actual. He has his own ideas of what to do in this simulation-"
"That bozo!" a female voice roared from the commander's seats. Emily Sandhurst commander of HMSLAC Berserker, the lead Shrike was almost screaming. "That pencil neck idiot wants to tell us what to do? Again?"
"Stand down, Em." Suggins said mildly. The woman flounced back in her chair angrily. "We're going to be working with him, team. Whether it's in sims or in real life, we have to add him to the equation."
"Yeah." Tony La Bianca, commanding HMSLAC Weasel, the lead ferret pilot snorted. "Add him and delete us."
"Come on, guys, no one chooses his test." Watson, commander of GSNSLAC Gabriel said. There was a groan, but more good natured this time.
"I know you Graysons look forward to going to Jesus, Abe, but if he's in charge, we're all going to meet him sooner than I'd like." Marsha O'Neal, commander of HMSLAC Reaper, also Shrike element 2 commander replied.
"That's quite enough." Suggins said, her voice a little sharper this time. Her squadron was atypical in more ways than one. Most squadrons were all one type, Shrikes, Ferrets, or Katanas. Except for tossing them together when losses harrowed the LAC ranks, no one had even considered the make up of her team. Even then in normal circumstances like went to like 90% of the time. But with a cruise of ten months anticipated, there would be no juggling around like that. A lot of squadron commanders would see this as torment. Suggins saw it as a challenge. The three types of bird had different flight characteristics and roles.
The Shrike had been designed as a shipkiller from the start, and literally built around her battlecruiser sized grazer with her missile tubes tacked on almost as an afterthought. The A models had proven deadly to battleships at Second Hancock Station, but design flaws had been detected. The newer B model had removed the small landing bay at the stern and replaced them with six more point defense clusters.
On the electronic warfare end the ships were light, except when it came to stealth. So the next type, the Ferret was designed. The grazer was replaced with more missile stowage, and among them were the first fruits of the Ghostrider technology that could be scaled down for them, primarily decoys. However the Ferret could not reply to a full up warship in energy weapon range, so the Ferrets with their 56 missiles compared to the 20 of a Shrike became long range snipers rather than closing in with their fellows.
Like always the Graysons went their own way again. They had assumed, logically, that an enemy might design their own LACs to confront the Alliance, and went one step further. And so the Katana class was born. They replaced the main gun with three superdreadnought sized point defense laser clusters, balanced out it's missile battery to 84 by replacing those missiles with a variant of the standard Mk 31 countermissile, the Viper. A mixed shipkiller and counter missile, the Viper used a single lasing rod to make them highly efficient LAC killers at the expense of having almost no offensive capability against larger vessels. When the second war with Haven began, they proved their worth as additional counter missile defense for larger warships since they carried what amounted to 234 counter missiles compared to the 100 of the Shrike, and the 150 of a Ferret.
But if they were exercising with the ship herself, they had again been tasked as augmenting her defense; and while Tac actual had learned well to handle the small ships in that role, the A-tac was still learning.
"Think of it as a learning experience." She told her crews, drawing a groan from the command pilots.
"Him learning what not to do? Or us looking again on the brighter side of death?" Valerious Dracul asked. Son of an immigrant family from what used to be Romania on Old Earth, Valerious claimed to be a linear descendant of the original Vlad Tepes, as his ship, the Shrike HMSLAC Vampire proclaimed. A devotee of every holo or video made about vampires, talking about the brighter side of death came from an ancient film named Van Helsing. The first time he used the phrase. Someone had repeated word for word what the title character had said, 'There's a brighter side of death?' and his reply was exact, 'Of course. It's just harder to see'.
Everyone laughed. Suggins tapped the podium. All right, people, stations." They stood, walking down the passageway to their boats. Above each entry way there was a name for the LAC beyond it, Berserker, Reaper, Panther, Vampire to port opposite Weasel and Wolverine; the two Ferrets with Shrikes Lillian and Chocaholic to starboard. Last to port was the last Shrike, Sabertooth, then GSNSLAC Gabriel, with Michael and Azreal, her ship last to starboard.
The Graysons had been late in one thing, and that was in naming their LACs, and the all important nose art. The first LAC she had commanded had merely been LAC Montrose Echo four, meaning the fourth LAC in Echo, or number four squadron, assigned to the Carrier CLAC Montrose.
The Captain of GSNS Mordechai had instead assigned names from the bible, and somehow she had ended up in command of GSNSLAC Delilah. But regardless of the medals she bore, she had never told the Manticorans one thing; She had never commanded a Katana, she had not even commanded a Shrike. All of the women including loaners (ten of the twelve commanders and all of the junior officers and enlisted in her squadron) had been assigned to Ferrets. After all, a Ferret was supposed to hang back, be safe. But nowhere was safe during the hell of the Battle of Manticore.
In a desperate attempt to save some of her flock, Mordechai had ordered them to break through and join the 5,000 odd LACs of Manticore's home fleet. But that meant threading the gauntlet of almost 200 enemy superdreadnoughts and the tattered remains of their screen. He had assumed that the ships of the wall would ignore them, but the screen had not. Suggins had found herself racing toward certain death, and inside she had changed.
Her orders, crisp and cool had kept her own crew calm even as everyone senior to her died. Then she, not the squadron, but she herself had found the last ship blocking their flight, a damaged but still battle worthy battlecruiser. The sole survivor behind her had gone dry helping to kill one of the two heavy cruisers her squadron had claimed, so there was no doubt. The missiles she had not fired as yet- almost twenty, punched into the massive vessel, the last fired at less than 500 kilometers; not knife fighting range, but suicide range. Her ship had passed it seconds before the forward fusion plant had destroyed the ship, and she, along with her sole wingman had survived.
Yet she had felt like a fraud as the Grayson Ambassador bestowed the Grayson Shield and Protector's Gratitude. When she had met Queen Elizabeth and had been given the Monarch's thanks, she had almost told that woman of her own cowardice, that she still had those missiles because others had died instead of her killing the cruisers. But she had said nothing.
When she had volunteered fior this assignment, the Manticoran navy had given her one of the Katanas fresh from the builder, assuming such a brave woman would want to get up close and personal with the enemy. But in her heart, she knew a coward was cowering in the corner, hoping she would never face that hell again.
She turned the corner, and stopped, staring at the nose art for her ship. While the ship Witch Maiden had been christened into the Andermani navy, albeit briefly, they had never designed of issued a plaque for that. Again when the rechristened Witch Maiden returned to Manticoran service a new plaque had not been issued. Someone in her first crew draft had noticed this, and had looked to his fellow crew members, and found Yeoman 1st class Pankowski. A devotee of old fashioned Japanese Anime and graphic novels of the last Century pre-Diaspora Pankowski had agreed to draw a proper ship's crest and motto.
Everyone that had boarded her had seen that new ship's crest; a young woman, dressed in a robe that exposed both legs and arms, one hand outstretched in claws toward the viewer, the other at shoulder's height with a ball of fire in her palm. Below it was the motto:
Who touches me dies.
When the squadron came aboard, their commanders had again availed themselves of Pankowski's services. Lillian had been the most fun to him, because after creating the logo, a woman sitting in a rocking chair knitting, the commander Hiram Logan had mentioned that 'Lillian' was his pit bull terrier. Everyone had roared when the new logo showed a woman with a pit bull head, blood dripping from her jowls as her 'paws' knitted.
Suggins had assumed she would merely be called 'Witch Maiden 001', or maybe 'Witch Maiden parasite actual', meaning the commander of the attached LACs. But her crew, and especially her LAC crews had blindsided her. The crews, dipping into the beer and booze a bit much had chosen the name the Manticoran Press had given her. So as every non Katana unit had been assigned a name of choice, the Katana had been given Angel names. Michael, equated with Jesus, the lead angel when he protects the followers of Christ. Gabriel, the Angel who would sound the last trump (As it is called) before Armageddon, and Azrael, Angel of Death, one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.
She had been nicknamed 'Lady Death' by the Manticoran press after the Battle of Manticore, and as much as she had resisted that tag, it had stuck. When she had come aboard there had been bets among her LAC crews about her reaction to Pankowski's artwork. She had looked up at her own face (As she did now) above a female body that exemplified the Japanese Zochichi; literally 'big boobs' genre, where a woman had a bust size beyond even an adolescent's dream of a large bust. The figure stood adamant, her left leg forward, and from her hands a scythe hung, the blade to her right. Her face was furious, and below it the logo, 'I've come for you'. She had surprised them all by laughing until she collapsed. Her attempt to change the name had fallen flat. After all Azrael was also the Grim Reaper, and they had a Reaper all ready. But that ship bore a skeleton warrior on a horse, and she had her self with ginormous udders.
So she looked at herself with an 'I' cup and merely smiled as she went aboard. Her crew, like her first commands all women, nodding to them as she assumed her command chair. She adjusted her headset, then touched the command push.
"Lady Death online." She reported.
"Stand by."
On the bridge Captain Duvalier motioned Samuel Zachery and midshipman Carruthers toward the tactical stations. "Man your stations."
"Ma'am." Zachery looked at the empty Tac actual seat, where Lt Hughes would be sitting.
The captain gave him a sour expression. "Lieutenant Hughes is having her appendix removed. If you wish we can signal the enemy and ask them to attack when she has recovered..." This was the second full week of drills twice a day where Hughes was absent, and the captain had not even been creative at first. But she had used her own brand of humor as well, saying Hughes was in the bath, having her hair or nails done. But after two weeks of resounding failures, she had not even tried anymore.
Zachary had flushed and refused, taking the Tac officer station. As they took their positions, the scenario loaded; two forces, one of two as yet identified ships 20 million kilometers (one light minute) ahead, with a second 20 million kilometers aft and closing, identified as four Nevada Class battle-cruisers. He spent a few seconds looking at their movement. The ones aft were running toward them at 4.8 kilometers per second. The ones forward... They had been closing for... eighteen minutes, but had decelerated at 3.9 kilometers per second, so now they hung there a light minute away maintaining their separation as Witch Maiden advanced at just under two kilometers a second.
"Flush our birds." He ordered.
"Sir-" Abigail began. "Recon birds?"
"Do it."
She sighed. "Lady Death flush your birds." On the screens a dozen wedges appeared. Zachary marked their positions, and the squadron split; four Shrikes with a Ferret and a Katana slid forward as three Shrikes supported by a Ferret and two Katana moved aft.
"SSDD."
"Keep it down Lillian." The calm female voice cut across. The LACs moved away, taking station half a million kilometers both fore and aft.
Six minutes flowed by, the stern targets were closing fast, already over 30,000 kps of overtake. At that rate they would be within range in less than ten minutes.
"Roll pods. Bring beta targets under fire." Abby's fingers flew as she programmed the pods, dumping them in swarms of six to fall aft. As the fourth pattern dropped all of them launched their missiles and 240 missiles screamed aft, targeted at one of their pursuers.
"Four minutes, ten seconds to attack range."
"Witch Maiden, targets ahead. Missile Pods!" Four pods opened fire at less than half a million kilometers ahead of the covering LACs. Then a hundred pods as far away as seven million kilometers all lit off. It wasn't a missile stream, it was a missile torrent as 800 missiles screamed toward them.
The covering force astern lifted, running toward the sudden menace, and the six LACs ahead began firing missiles into the comber of rampaging death.
"They are Pioneers!" Abby shouted.
The missiles began to die as counter missiles went out, but at this range there was time for only a single launch per tube, a single shot from the point defense lasers before they were in attack range. The lead LACs were smothered as the five survivors of the first wave rolled and fired from 10,000 kilometers away. Three survived that attack but the next was moving faster and thirty more missiles killed them.
Then it was Witch Maiden's turn as almost 700 missiles still bored in. Two minutes after the attack began the entire force was dead.
It was silent on the bridge as the screens went blank. Then a laconic voice from Chocaholic offered, "At least it was quick."
"Can you say no effing way to stay alive?" came from Wolverine.
"You could have used some recon birds out there, Mister Zachary." The captain said in a cold voice. "It would have taken the enemy almost four minutes to reprogram his birds, and pods are easy soft kills. That is, if you see them first."
"Yes, Ma'am."
"Exercise complete." She walked out of the bridge.
"As if we had a chance." Zachary commented.
Rebecca walked into CIC and grinned at Gaelin. "You are so bad, XO."
He started to answer, but another voice cut across. Zachary on the bridge said, "We couldn't have done any better."
"Sir, may I have a word in private?" Abigail asked in a voice close to liquid helium in warmth.
The senior officers looked at each other, then tiptoed from the compartment, and into the passageway between the bridge and CIC. They hid against the bulkhead as the hatch opened, and the two younger officers came out. Zachary merely looked curious, but Carruthers looked like she was about to rip the bulkheads down with her bare hands. "Request permission to speak freely, sir?" The girl asked still looking away.
"Granted."
She spun like a breech block closing, hands clasped behind her back. "Sir, with all due respect, you have your head so far up your ass that they have to pump in daylight. We had a chance in that last one to save ourselves, but you screwed up from the first second."
"Abby-"
"If it had been real we'd all be dead, and it would be your fault! That's almost 30 times in the last few weeks where you made the mistakes and we poor peons had to try to fix it!"
"That is enough-"
"No sir, it is in my opinion not quite enough! I was better than you are right now in my beginning tactical class and I'll bet that if we trade places the next time, I'll do better with my eyes closed!" The senior officers watched as Zachary took a step toward the smaller woman, fists clenched.
"If hitting me will get you out of this stupid rut you've made for the entire deployment, then beat me to a bloody pulp! Go ahead!" She stepped up until she stood glaring up at him within easy reach. "Do it!"
Gaelin opened his mouth, and Rebecca's hand covered it. Then she stepped from the shadows. "Problems?" She asked softly. The pair spun around, their conversation not quite as private as they had hoped. Zachary unclenched his fists.
"No, captain. We were discussing the last exercise."
"Really." She crossed her arms, foot tapping, lips pursed. "At the top of your lungs, loud enough to be heard in CIC." She lied.
"The midshipman just bet me she could do better, but we haven't set the stakes yet." He looked at the girl. "What were you going to bet?"
"I prove myself better, and you buy the drinks until I am plastered, sir." She snarled. "But I'm a light weight, so if I win you do it twice. If you win, I just have to get you drunk once."
"You're on. When and where?"
"We're all standing here and nothing is planned except cargo handling." The captain put in.
"Agreed." The girl thrust out her hand sharply, and Zachary shook it.
"Then man your stations. I will let the exec know." Rebecca turned, walking back toward CIC as the juniors returned to the bridge. The hatch had barely closed before she began to giggle like a school girl. "So far up his ass we have to pump in daylight?" She gasped. Gaelin was standing against the bulkhead, shoulders shaking convulsively.
"Such language! A good thing she asked to speak freely first, or we'd be seeing her at a Captain's Mast."
Rebecca finally got over her giggles. Wiping her eyes. "Pick your nastiest scenario, Number One. Has to be a fair test."
"Like the last one was? What Sollie in his right mind would waste half of his pods trying to nail this bucket?"
"One that knew about our pods, that's who." She replied. "We'll face someone eventually that does, and someone with enough brains to pour water out of his boots would come up with it eventually. To your post."
"Yes, Ma'am."
She walked forward, and the cold superior captain was back as she crossed the bridge to the command chair. "Whenever you are ready, Abby."
"Waiting on the Exec, ma'am." The girl replied crisply. "I've already warned pri-fly."
"So nice to have attentive subordinates." She hit the annunciator. "Number One, round two."
The screens hashed, then they saw a single point source behind them, closing fast. It read CONTACT 20 MILLION KM; EIGHT BC, FOUR HEAVY CRUISERS SCREENING; APPROACH ACCELERATION 480G, SPEED NOW 30,000 KPS.
A shell of three dozen Ghostrider drones raced away forward.
"Contact! Enemy at 000, range 25 million km, four sources, acceleration 380 kps."
"Ma'am, suggest turn to starboard of 45 degrees." Abigail suggested as her fingers flashed across her board.
"Agreed, tactical. Helm, 45 degrees starboard. Come to 221 slash 000 true."
"221 slash 000 true, aye, ma'am." On the screen their heading changed to the suggested heading, and the ship charged forward now denying both forces a clear approach.
"Contact! Six sources, range 27 million kilometers, bearing 005!"
All well within range for the Hammers. She leaned back. "Azrael, this is A-Tac. Did you discuss our option with the Exec?"
"We have, A-Tac. He tells me it has not been tried, but we should be able to handle 60 birds each."
She smiled savagely. "All birds, deploy in groups of four, low powered wedges only."
"Roger, deploying now." The LACs dropped away. At 2nd Hancock using both low powered wedges and stealth, they had been invisible to Manticoran sensors at 30 light seconds; nine million kilometers even charging in at 500 gravities. With wedges powered up but not running, they had been undetected at just under a light second's range against Havenite sensors.
Even assuming parity, which no one who had run into the Sollies was willing to grant, that meant they would get into position for what she planned.
On the screen the teams of four raced away at more than twice their own speed of advance, the first team heading aft slowing and coming to rest at 14 million kilometers from the enemy now just under 18 million kilometers astern.
"Cargo five, four patterns of Hammers, now, now, now!" On the screen the pods dropped astern, then 240 missiles lanced aft. Zachary looked at the targeting information. "Abby-"
"Trust me, sir." She said absently. "Wolverine, they're inbound."
"We kind of noticed."
In front of them, the other two teams were still running forward. "Skipper, suggest 25 degrees port to split our opponents."
"Agreed, helm, steer 25 degrees port."
Again the aspect changed. If they were on a clock face target Alpha was at 5 o'clock, Beta at 10, and Gamma at 2. The missiles just fired had just under five minutes to fly.
"Rails, four patterns of Mk23s, now!" She was setting their headings as they were dropping, and ordered a third set of four as those missiles fired. 720 missiles were aimed not at their targets, but at a point in space 14 million kilometers closer, where the LACs waited.
"Good lock." Wolverine reported, and that group of missiles arced up and toward the enemy. Behind that wave came another and another at one minute intervals.
"Missile separation!' Alpha has fired pods tractored inside their wedges, at the LACs! 240 plus bound!"
"Wolverine, weapons free, I repeat, weapons free!"
The third pattern was racing by the LACs as 24 point defense clusters and 16 missile tubes went to rapid fire. They thought the enemy missile would be ballistic after 13 million kilometers, but better to make sure. The enemy salvo went from over 240 to 200, 180, 150, a hundred, then dropped like a stone as lasers also went to rapid fire along with two massive grasers. The last of the salvo died 200,000 kilometers from the LACs as the first salvo from Witch Maiden screamed in. Even 12 warships were no match for it; after all, these had been designed to fight either the Manticoran Navy or Haven's forces, both of which had at least half again as many counter missile tubes, and almost twice as many point defense lasers. 200 missiles broke through the missile envelope, and almost 150 cleared the last ditch laser barrier. They all charged down on one battlecruiser, and her last ditch defenses weren't enough. The ship staggered, then disappeared as her fusion bottles went.
And 11 more salvos of equal size were inbound.
Forward, the missiles were bearing down on what the recon drones reported as two superdreadnoughts and two cruisers in Beta and four cruisers in Gamma. The same number of missiles had been fired at each, and the LACs offered not only mid course corrections but also exclusion files as the enemy had activated their Halo/Aegis variant anti missile defenses when the ship had fired. The missiles again chose one target, and one SD staggered away, a clear mission kill from Beta, another exploded in Gamma.
Ten minutes into the engagement, with seven battle-cruisers, four SDs and five cruisers dead, Rebecca shut down the simulation. It was a clear overwhelming victory. The screens again showed Augustus below them.
In Vine Et Veritas
A/N, after Rebecca and Jinhua had their drunken evening, I wanted to show the actuality rather than the aftermath. So I created the next section in what I call Drunk-Speak. To write in Drunk-Speak follow these simple guidelines:
1) script it out first. Know what they are going to say then;
2) rewrite the statement, but picture someone three sheets to the wind, with maybe a fourth being deployed, and:
3) Have fun with it!
Abby looked into her, what, fifth, sixth pint of beer? Samual (Call Me Sam) Zachary was all right really, and while she had stuck to beer, he was drinking two shots of whiskey to each pint. He had just admitted that it was his love life that was causing the problem, and she was following it, sort of.
"There I wash, stanning onna, onna, the entryway thingie when my lover of three years told me she'd met someone on Heph, on Heph, onna station, and they were getting morted, no, wrong word. Hitch.
"Bad." She said. She was peering owlishly at the menu. "Barkeep! Wha's this duppelback thing?"
"Doppelbock." He replied, smiling. "Double strength dark Lager."
"Gimmie one." She said. Then she turned back to her partner. "Is that all?"
He shook his head, knocking back another jigger, then pouring. "Nah. She was onna, onna the station when the attack hit, so I don even have a chance to reconcile."
"Rilly bad, sir." She sipped the dark beer. Not bad. "Sir, if you wan some advize, advise, suggestion, I think you need to-" She considered. "Thing ya do with chickens."
"Fry?"
"Nah-"
"Barbeque?"
"Nah. Not chicken, eggs-"
Hatch?"
"No." She sipped. "Laid."
"Huh?"
"Get laid."
He considered, sipping his next shot instead of knocking it back. "So who?"
"Sasha Dwyer likes you." she replied. "Thins you re dreamboat."
"Thinks?"
"Tha to." She replied.
"Really?"
"Rilly, rilly." She replied. She turned, motioning and almost knocking herself from the stool when she did. Only a quick grab by Zachary kept her in her seat. She pointed, one eye closing to clear the double vision she was dealing with. The woman she marked out was a 1st class petty officer 1.5 meters tall, with bright red hair. "She likes you lots. Becca said so."
He pondered. "Tha Cap'n-"
"No." She waved her arms, falling backwards, and again he rescued her. "Cap'n an, an, Lady Death, they have th same first name, who-da thunk?" She smiled, then her smile froze, and she took on a greenish tinge.
"Sir, I have ta, have ta-" She clapped her hand over her mouth, and staggered toward the freshers.
Zachary looked after her for several seconds. What was she suggesting? Wasn't that a violation of Article One-Nineteen? Then again it only applied to personnel in the same direct chain of command. Would an LAC crewman be in his line of command?
A cup of coffee landed in front of him, and he looked at it blearily for several seconds, then at the hand of the woman that had set it before him. What was the name? "Sasha?"
"Yes, sir." She peeled his hand away from the shot glass, folding it around the cup she had delivered. "I thought you've had enough to drink tonight."
He picked it up, the scalding beverage tearing up his throat. "God, need sugar." She merely picked up a spoon, dumping sugar until he signaled her to stop. He finished the cup, then looked at the second cup she delivered, already sweetened.
"So you... what, like me?"
"With all due respect sir-"
"S'okay, I'm outta line." He said. Of course the girl had been wrong, why else-
A hand caught his chin, and turned his face to look at her. "I wasn't saying no, sir. It's just as they say on Grayson, 'drink promotes the desire, yet removes the ability." She leaned forward, her lips touching his cheek. "When we do... that, I want you to perform."