Chapter 9
"Of course I will do what I can, but I am not sure I can do much to assist while I'm down here on the planet Mr. President," Susan said. "Do you know if there is any of the long-range communications equipment online here yet?"
"I don't think we do, but surely you can use your link to call up your ship and get them to do something." The President's voice still had more than a little desperation in it.
Susan shook her head. " These links are good, but not that good. If I was back at the city, or my shuttle I would be able to reach them, but I think I am out of range here. But surely you would have some sort of communications equipment here."
"I don't know," the President said, scanning the room. "Kriesler will know," he said confidently as he spotted the person he had been seeking, a tall businessman near the far wall.
As Mitrovic hurried through the crowd, Susan grabbed his aide by the arm, leading him towards the windows, and out of earshot of the other partygoers, who had mainly congregated near the centre of the large room. "Alright," she ordered. "Tell me everything you know, and quickly."
"I… I don't know much Captain," he stuttered. "I just received a message from the EAS Apollo that they were tracking incoming fighters. They didn't say how many, or where they were coming from. There was no mention of any larger ships and so I assumed they were raiders."
"Never assume anything," Susan said. Glancing across the room she saw Colonel Kroehn making his way through the crowd with Major Logan at his side. Susan eyed the Major for a brief moment, noting that her marine commander was looking a little worse for wear. She wondered how much Lily had been drinking, but knew she couldn't blame the Major is she was a little drunk. This was a social event, after all, and she had not placed any restrictions on the activities of her staff while here.
As soon as the Colonel reached her side she asked him, "is there an operating com channel somewhere in this place."
The Colonel looked a little confused. "Not that I know of Captain," he replied. "Most of the base is still in the construction phase. I do know that they finished wiring main power through to most levels a few days back, so it is possible that the communications centre could be active, although like you I've only just arrived, so I'm not completely familiar with this base yet. Why?"
"It appears that we are under attack Colonel," Susan said grimly. "I don't know all the details yet, but... wait a minute." She spun back to face the aide. "How did you receive the message from the Apollo?"
"Um, from Reagan dome Captain," he replied nervously. "It was on the emergency channel for the president."
"Is there any way you can call them back?" Susan asked.
"From one of the crawlers. They have a long range transmitter capable of sending as far as the city."
"Can they send to orbiting vessels?" Susan asked hopefully.
"I don't think so Captain," the aide replied. "But I can check. I know they are mainly used for scouting and overland trips like the one from the dome to the fortress. Reagan can relay messages though if we reach them."
"Good." Susan tapped her chin thoughtfully for a moment. "Go and set up a link between the city and us using the transmitters on one of those crawlers. I want communications with the fleet as soon as possible."
"No need for that Captain," a voice cut in.
Susan turned to face the speaker and saw it was the businessman President Mitrovic had identified as Kriesler, and standing beside him Mitrovic himself. "And why is that Mr. Kriesler?" she asked.
"Because the computers for operations centre on level seventeen have installed and should be functional. I don't know the functions of half the systems they have in there, but they are wired up to the sensor array and communications dish. We also finished installing power to most levels, and although I don't think the Earthforce team has finished installing and testing the software, I'm pretty sure they said communications were online."
"Great," Susan said. She grabbed the aide's arm again to stop him from wandering off. "Go and round up all the Earthforce officers you can find and tell them to get down to level seventeen as soon as possible. With you permission of course Sir," she said turning to the Colonel.
"Of course," he replied. "You seem to have things under control Captain, so why don't you take charge of whatever is happening up there while I keep Mr. Mitrovic's guests happy."
"Sounds fine to me Colonel," she replied with a grim smile. "Although I think you have the harder job."
"Maybe I do Captain," Kroehn said with an answering smile as he gently led the President of Proxima away from the small gathering of officers.
Susan had the strangest impression that the Colonel was relieved that she was here, that somehow he didn't really want the responsibility of commanding troops. Normally she would dismiss it as instinct, but this was stronger than anything she had ever felt on previous occasions. She didn't have time to consider it though, so tossed that suspicion aside for now and turned to the aide again. "Why are you still here," she said with a frown. "You have your orders, get moving."
"Y… Yes Captain," he replied with an impression of a salute. As he hurried away to carry out his orders, he could not help but feel excited by what was happening, despite the seriousness of the situation. He had always wanted to be in the military but his father had insisted that he go into the nice safe public service. Now at last he was going to be involved in a real battle. Norris Payne could barely contain his excitement as he rushed to do the Captain's bidding.
As soon as he was gone, Susan forgot about him and turned to the Major who was rubbing the back of her head. "What is the matter with you Major?" she asked.
Lily snatched her hand away from her head in embarrassment. "Nothing Captain, just a minor accident. I didn't look were I was going and hit my head. Hurts a bit, but I'll be fine."
"Well be more careful next time," Susan said.
"Oh believe me I will Captain," Major Logan replied. "It definitely will not happen again." Then under her breath, so the captain couldn't hear, she muttered, "next time that Psi-Corp bitch is going to be the one coming off second best."
"You can come with me Major," Susan ordered. "I don't want anyone unauthorised getting into this operations room. If the president's guests start to panic I don't want them getting in my way."
"You can count on me Captain," the Major assured her.
Susan nodded and seeing the President's aide had gathered all the rest of the Earthforce officers, she led Major Logan and the businessman Kriesler towards the lifts down to the lower levels.
As she left the party, Susan took a slight detour to snatch a rather surprised Lieutenant-Commander Schmitt from the arms of his attractive dance partner and led him towards the exit.
"I suppose there is a good reason behind this Captain," Alister asked her as soon as the doors to the lift had closed. He sounded more amused that annoyed, but obviously had not yet grasped the seriousness of events.
"You bet Mr Schmitt," Susan told him. "According to the President's aide a force of raiders is about to attack the planet."
"Damn," the flight commander swore. "That is a good reason. Any ideas on how many and the size of the ships?"
"Not yet. However, there is apparently some kind of operations room down here on one of the lowers levels. I am hoping it will have a communications link that is operational so I can call the Rasputin. "
"It would have to happen when we were down here," Schmitt complained. "I was really looking forward to trying out one of those new model fighters in combat. I don't suppose this operations room has a tactical display does it? I can still direct my pilots from down here if it has an up-to-date tactical system."
"It has all the latest systems direct from Earthforce," Kriesler cut in. "We were asked to make sure that it was up and running before the rest of the fortress, just in case of an emergency. "Um… although I'm not sure if everything is working yet," he admitted. "The consoles were installed, and most of the wiring has been done, but then the President asked that we complete the observation lounge before we went on to, as he put it, less important matters."
The lift came to a stop and its doors opened up into a dark room. Fumbling around in the dark Kriesler was able to find the light controls. "Sorry Captain, but none of the voice control system here are operational yet. They will be going in next week."
"You know a lot about the construction Mr. Kriesler," Susan commented as she walked into the large, and now well lit, operations room. "I thought you were just an businessman."
"Yes, but my company has the contract for the construction of almost the entire fortress, so I have been around here keeping an eye on things."
"Good," Susan replied looking around a still unfinished room crammed full of consoles that were still covered with plastic wrapping to keep the dust and paint off them while the rest of the room was finished. "Then you can tell me which of these is my communications console."
Kriesler looked around and shrugged helplessly. "I am afraid I have no idea Captain," he admitted. "My company only designed the main fortress, all of the classified stuff was done by a team from Earthforce, and they would be back at the dome at this time of the night."
"This looks like a communications console over here Captain," Alister called from the other side of the room.
"Get it up and running Lieutenant-Commander and I will be with you in a minute," Susan ordered him before turning back to Major Logan. "Major, you stay here and make sure that no one except for Earthforce officers is allowed into this room until I say so. Let President Mitrovic and his aide in, but no other civilians." She turned to walk across the room when a sudden thought hit her and stopped. "Oh and Major, that includes Dr. Kozlowski. I don't want him in here either, there is no telling what he might do."
"Yes Captain," the Major replied, taking up a stance in front of the lift doors and crossing her arms, ready to stop anyone who might try to barge their way into the room.
Walking across to the communications console Susan saw that Alister had already powered it up, and she breathed a sigh of relief, realising that the power to the room had been connect to more than just the lights. "Get me the Rasputin," she ordered, taking a seat on the edge of the console.
Alister's fingers flew across the console as he established a link to the warship. To everyone's surprise, the system connected him without any hitch. "We have a two-way link with the Rasputin, Captain. Your link should be working now.
To test his claims, Susan tapped her link, which was no longer just a hi-tech timepiece. "Ivanova to the bridge."
Commander Petrov answered her almost immediately. "Captain," he Commander said, and Susan thought she recognised an undertone of relief in his voice. "Good to hear from you, things are a little hairy up here at the moment."
"What can you tell me," she asked. "All we heard down here was that a raider attack was in progress."
"They are not raiders Captain," Petrov informed her. "In fact we don't know what they are. The Apollo spotted them about fifteen minutes ago in a group of about a hundred or so and relayed us the information. They are roughly octagonal in shape and do not match any known silhouette."
"Are you certain they are hostile," Susan cut in, eager to find out that important detail before anything else.
"No Captain we are not," Petrov answered. "The Apollo sent out a scout about ten minutes ago and it should be within range soon. If they attack then we can be sure they are hostile. Commander Quinn on the Apollo thinks that they could be from some new alien race we haven't met yet, however I think he could be wrong. I order an active scan of their hulls, and although the does appear to be some interference, from what we could make out, their hull composition is a match for Earth technology."
"Some new raider vessel," Susan queried. "I haven't heard of any major raider attacks in a while. John's... I mean President Sheridan's forces have been keeping them quiet. They lost most of their big carrier ships last year, but for them to muster a hundred fighters, that is a fairly big commitment."
"Well I don't if these are raider vessels or not, but we certainly haven't detected any vessels large enough to be a carrier, or any jump points forming, and with the other destroyers we have been watching most of the system. I'd say that they have to be coming from somewhere in the system. They are way to small to have any kind of jump engine, smaller even than a Starfury."
"That is small," Susan said. "Ok Commander, I will leave everything in your hands up there while we see what we can do to help you down here. Keep in touch and inform us of any developments."
"Will do Captain," Petrov replied before Susan shut off her link.
She turned to Alister. "Lieutenant-Commander I want that line kept open, and when the other captain arrive, assist them in contacting their ships as well. We may need to co-ordinate everything from down here."
As the flight commander nodded and set about his task Susan stood, having just noticed that the rest of the Earthforce officers were arriving. Unfortunately, several of them looked like they had been having more than a little to drink, 'Well they are not going to be much help,' Susan thought to herself as she strode across the room to greet them.
Captain Murdoch James pushed his way to the front. "I don't suppose you want to tell us what is going do you Captain," he asked, his voice thick with anger. "All I know is I am grabbed by this idiot here." The Captain pointed to the young aide. "And forced to come down to this place, whatever it is."
"Bad news I am afraid Captain," Susan told him, ignoring his angry tone of voice. "It seems a large force of raider ships has been sighted, and it looks like they might be about to launch an attack on the planet. I have just spoken to my executive officer and he said that your vessel has just sent out a scout."
"What!" James cried. "That fool, you don't send out a single fighter to investigate an enemy fleet, all that get you is a dead fighter. We learned that back in the Minbari War. Get my ship on the link at once."
"I am afraid it is too late Captain," Alister Schmitt suddenly said, looking up from the communications console. "Commander Petrov has just reported that the scout has been destroyed by the enemy fighters. He never even had a chance to fire a shot."
"Damn," the Apollo's captain cried. "Get that idiot Quinn on the link now, and tell him I am taking over command of this battle. Get hold of the other two destroyers as well and get them to follow the Apollo's lead, starting with launching every fighter we have." He turned back to Susan. "Captain, you know what you ship is capable of better than me. Is it ready for battle?"
Susan shook her head. "I don't believe so Captain," she replied. "Unfortunately, I have been given a ship that is still being tested, hell the designer is still on board upgrading systems. Most of the crew don't even know how to use some of the new weapons yet. We do, however, have a full load of Starfury pilots though, some of the best in Earthforce in fact. Tell Commander Petrov to scramble them and place them under your command. I will see if I can't raise some sort of defence out of whatever Proxima has, although I don't imagine that that will be much."
James nodded and looking over at the other officers signalled for one of his own men to come over and assist Lieutenant-Commander Schmitt at the communications console. The other two Captains, Waterman and Maruichi, hurried over to his side to contact their own vessels while the rest of the officers, both those from the destroyers, and those attached to the new base milled about looking confused.
Susan quickly scanned the room looking for anything or anyone useful she could use. A console in the middle of the room leapt out at her as soon as her eyes passed over it and she realised that it must be one of the new holographic tactical computers. She had read about them in a recent article in an Earthforce magazine while on Station Prime. Dragging off the plastic sheeting, she looked around for the controls that would activate the display.
"I can help you with that Captain," one of the officers said hurrying over to assist her. "I am going to be assigned here as soon as the fortress is operational so I know a little about the systems."
"Do you know which ones are working at the moment?" Susan queried him as he activated the holographic display.
"I am afraid not Captain," he said completing the start up sequence and standing back to watch as a wire-frame representation of the planet formed above the console. A few more taps of the keyboard and a series of multi-coloured dots appeared. It didn't take long for everyone in the room to work out which colour represented what.
A cluster of red dots a little away from the planet were obviously the enemy fighters, while closer in Susan and the other officers could see four green dots. One of the green dots was likely the Rasputin, as it was sitting slightly apart from the others and the others marked the positions of the three Omega class destroyers. There were also three blue dots. The two blue dots near the Rasputin were obviously the troops transports, still unloading their cargo of Earthforce soldiers, which meant that the last dot must be the construction site for the new station.
"Can you get any more detail Lieutenant?" Susan asked. "Fighters, headings, that sort of thing?"
The lieutenant quickly tapped a few more keys and the display went black. With a look of embarrassment, he quickly worked to restore the image and soon had the projection working again. This time there were a lot more dots on the holographic projection, and each ship noted on the display had direction arrows. "It looks like the enemy fighters are heading towards the station Captain," he informed Susan.
"Looks like it," she agreed as she also noticed the heading arrow sitting just above the group of tiny red dots. Then a cloud of small green dots began to erupt from the front of the warships and she realised that their fighters had now been launched. It still looked as though the enemy had more fighters though, and if they were going to attack the station then the destroyers would be unable to fire for fear of hitting the still only half-complete station. Destroyers were of little use against fighter though as their tracking systems couldn't target the fast-moving ships quick enough to hit them.
A ruckus at the lift door caught her attention and Susan looked up from her musings on the display to see President Mitrovic, several aides, and Colonel Kroehn making their way into the room. She sent a brief glare in the direction of Major Logan who shrugged helplessly as if to ask who she was to stop the President of Proxima's aides from entering. Fortunately the President seemed content to just watch for the moment, and if he hadn't she would have ordered him removed. If there was one thing she hated more than anything else, it was civilians who tried play soldier. It always ended in disaster.
Colonel Kroehn, seeing the holographic display crossed the room to take a closer look for himself. "Well how does it look, Captain?"
"Not good Colonel," she said, pointing out the enemy fighters on the display. "It looks like there are at least a hundred of them, and while we have nearly the same number of fighters ourselves we don't know the capabilities of the enemy vessels. We do however know that they are hostile and they have already destroyed one of our fighters."
"Why can't we just send the destroyers in to take them out?" the Colonel asked, pointing towards the large green dots.
"Because it looks likely that they will try to attack the station construction site and if the destroyers move in they will most likely end up blowing away half that station while they are trying to hit the fighters."
"We might be able to lure a few of the raiders away though," Captain James put in as he looked up from the communications console for the first time since the scout had been destroyed. "If we can get them away from the station then the destroyers can pick them off. I will see what I can organise."
"You can't destroy them before they reach the station?" Kroehn asked.
Susan shook her head. "I wish we could Colonel, that would make it a lot easier. Those raiders are moving too quickly for the destroyers to intercept them in time, so unless they change their course it is up to the fighters." Susan looked over to the Lieutenant who was operating the display. "How long until our fighters intercept the enemy?"
The Lieutenant responded at once, reading the data off the display. "Nearly thirty minutes Captain, that is if all our fighters attack at the same time."
"Which is what they will be doing," Captain James said, and he didn't sound like he wanted to hear any arguments on the matter.
"Thirty minutes it is then," Susan replied. She was about to ask the Colonel if there were any defence systems on the station when she noticed a blinking green light that appeared to be on the planet's surface. "What is that there Lieutenant?" she asked, pointing to the light.
He followed her arm until he discovered the location she was indicating. "That appears to be us, Captain."
"Why does it show up as green then? Only active units are meant to be green, shouldn't it be blue for non-combatant."
"Yes it should," the Lieutenant agreed looking close at the single blinking light.
Susan spun on the Colonel. "Colonel Kroehn," she asked. "Are there any active weapons on this base?"
He shook his head in the negative. "Not that I am aware of Captain."
Susan looked next at Kriesler who also shook his head. "Then why the hell does this computer show us up as an active unit? It couldn't be a software fault could it?" she asked, directing that last question to the Lieutenant operating the console.
"I don't know Captain," he replied, confused as she was by the blinking light. "This system is supposed to have some new semi-intelligent battle computer running the whole show. I was told that it was the latest things from Earthforce research."
"That's all very well," Susan told him. "But it doesn't explain why it is showing this base."
"I would assume because the computer knows something that we don't. It is telling me that this base can take an active part in any battle. Unfortunately, and I don't know if this is because the software has a glitch, which is possible, or because I don't know how to read it properly yet. Unfortunately, the software isn't telling us exactly how this base can assist, just that we can."
"Captain," Alister Schmitt suddenly spoke up.
"Not now Lieutenant-Commander, I am trying to work this out." Susan was eager to find any asset she could, and if this base could be of any assistance then she was damn sure she was going to make it pull its weight.
"But Captain," he continued in an insistent voice, one that made Susan listen to what he was saying this time. "I know what the computer is trying to tell you."
"You do," Susan asked incredulously. "Well out with it then."
"The fighters Captain," he replied. Then, when he noticed that her confused look continued, he added. "The fighters we saw down in the hanger. There are twelve brand new Thunderbolts sitting down there. Assuming they are armed and fully fuelled, then all they need is pilots."
A look of understanding crossed Susan face for a second, only to be replaced a moment later by a frown. "But do we have any pilots," she asked, looking at the Lieutenant across the console.
He shook his head, "I am afraid not Captain, they are not due for another week or more, along with second squadron of fighters. The only Earthforce officers on this base right now are those in this room, the rest are at the temporary base in Reagan dome, or arrived with you on those troops transports. We have been shuttling some of them down since they arrive, and I think they are being housed in the dome as well though, so not much help to us."
"Are those fighters ready to launch though Lieutenant?" Susan asked, an idea beginning to form in her mind. 'It has been too long since I flew a fighter,' she thought to herself.
"Yes, they were checked out fully by a team from the temporary base a few days ago, and all the weapons expect a load of missiles were installed. The launch tunnels are not ready though, there is no guidance system running."
"You don't need guidance systems with Thunderbolts," Alister told Susan, realising that she had probably had little experience with the new model fighters. "They are designed to be able to take off and land from planets, so have much better flight computers than the average Starfury, including terrain following radar and improved scanners."
Susan backed away from the console until she was standing next to her flight commander. "Are you thinking what I am," she asked him in a low voice, low enough that no one else in the room could hear them speak.
"Well it is not much use us just standing around here is it Captain." he replied in a similarly low voice. "Captain James should be able to handle things and given the odds, a couple more pilots, especially if you are as good a pilot as I have heard, could help swing the battle our way."
Susan nodded in agreement and looked up at the Lieutenant. "How long would it take a Thunderbolt Starfury to get from the surface up to the battle?" she asked him.
The Lieutenant looked at her in surprise, but fed the request into the battle computer. "Umm about ten minutes Captain, at maximum burn, fifteen if the pilot was conserving fuel. Any fighter launching from here would have a shorter distance to travel than the other Starfuries as the new station is virtually right over our heads."
"That would get us there in plenty of time," she said to Alister, again lowering her voice. After he nodded in agreement, she called over to Captain James who was still busy shouting at his executive officer. "Captain, I have something I would like to check out. Can you take care of things here?"
He didn't respond, instead just waving his hand in her direction. She chose to assume that was a signal of agreement and turned back to Alister. "Are you sure you want to do this Lieutenant-Commander. It could get quite nasty up there."
"Well you only live once Captain, and I could ask you the same question. Do you want to do this? Because, I'm keen if you are."
Susan thought for a second before reaching a decision. "Well there is not much I can do standing around here is there, and as you said a couple more pilots could swing the battle our way. And besides it is not as if I am not experienced enough, I used to fly missions all the time when I was a commander back on B5."
"Then we go?" he asked.
Susan nodded again and turned to the console operator. "Lieutenant you are in charge here. Give Captain James any help you can."
"Yes Sir," he said. "But Captain, where are you going?"
"To take the battle to the enemy Lieutenant," she replied, briskly walking toward the door with Lieutenant-Commander Schmitt in tow. Passing Major Logan, she drew the marine aside for a second and spoke to her softly. "Major, I am going down the hanger below. Can you come along, we might need your help."
The Major nodded and followed them as they entered the lift. President Mitrovic had noticed Susan's move toward the exit though and was heading towards them, a look of concern on his face at Susan's departure. She wasn't about to wait around and listen to his concerns though and before he could reach them, she pressed the lift's controls, sending it hurtling down towards the hanger below.