:: Unknown ::
Chapter 1
Piithik Naabal stared blankly at the view
screen embedded in the wall of his office, his mind wandering. He
no longer had to pay attention to the mining operations going on
outside, as had been required before. It was his own fault really
- he helped design the system that made this station what it was
- an almost totally computer run mining operation. Sure, the
resource collectors were still piloted, but the computers handled
the traffic control, the docking procedures, and the transport of
material to and from the station, along with just about
everything else. He allowed a smile to play across his face.
There hadn't been a lot of advances in computers in the 16 years
since the mothership had left Kharak. It made him proud to know
that he had helped build this state of the art system. The smile
left his face quickly as he thought of why it had been necessary.
Piithik let his thoughts wander some more. He
had felt proud before. He remembered the day when the mothership
had started its journey towards Hiigara. All the Kiithid rejoiced
at the news of the successful hyperspace jump. There were joyous
celebrations everywhere. He remembered the excitement being so
thick that he could hardly breath. That happiness had lasted many
months. Everything seemed to be going right during that time. The
divisions between Kiithid almost vanished. Space exploration and
seeing Hiigara were all people could talk about. They spoke of
the day when their fellow Kushan would return for them and take
them to their homeworld. But that had been ages ago.
The excitement had slowly died out. But the
Kushan that remained on Kharak still looked toward the sky,
toward the day when they believed their brethren would come back
for them. In fact, this belief was so strong that no one really
made any permanent plans beyond a few years anymore. His fellow
Kushan seemed almost apathetic towards doing anything
constructive. Space exploration had virtually stopped,
advancements in technology occurred very rarely, and efforts to
make Kharak a better place to live had slowly ground to a halt.
Piithik shook his head. As best he could figure, some word should
have been heard from the mothership or Hiigara years ago, but
nothing ever came. Well, that wasn't exactly true…
Piithik remembered how the Kiith Manaan had
grown tired of waiting and had started pushing out into space
again without the support of the other Kiithid. Since most of the
resources on Kharak had been used up building the mothership,
off-world sites had to be mined to build vehicles. The Manaan
Kiith weren't especially adept at building space stations and so
they had encouraged other Kiith to come with them, particularly
Naabal Kiith. Piithik couldn't remember why he had decided to
come along. Perhaps it was his own restlessness or maybe he was
just trying to get away from the apathy he saw all over Kharak.
Whatever the reason, he and some of his Kiith had come out here
to build the station. It had a name - Spatiik, after a beetle
that could live in the desert for months without any food or
water - but no one here ever called it that. They simply referred
to it as the station. He was proud of this place that he had
helped create. Like the Spatiik beetle it was almost completely
self-sufficient, it had to be. It wasn't the furthest mining
station from Kharak or the most remote but that didn't mean that
the few transport ships that visited them each year could fulfill
all their needs. The station could build its own resource
collectors, had a self sustaining drive torch, and could refuel 8
ships at a time. It wasn't anything special really, except for
the computer system.
This time Piithik didn't smile. In fact he felt
a bit nauseous. Usually it was easy for him to overlook the
reason why such an advanced computer system needed to be built in
light of his achievement in helping build it. He remembered a day
14 months ago that explained it all. He had been working in
central control along with Isibaat Manaan the station's
communications expert. The communications system had picked up
some faint signals one morning. They weren't understandable and
it wasn't anything much, but life on a mining station wasn't
exactly exciting, as Isibaat was fond of saying, and so she
decided to try and filter out as much noise as possible from the
signal and see if she could understand what was being said. What
finally came out made the hair on their arms bristle. The signal
was a distress call from someone claiming to be the captain of
the assault frigate "Shrike." In the background Piithik
had heard what sounded like the twisting of metal just before the
signal terminated. It didn't take them long to get the message to
the station manager who had listened and then ordered them not to
tell anyone about it.
More signals had come in the following weeks,
some of them in a language we had never heard. Those that could
be understood told a tale of conflict. From what Piithik could
tell, it appeared that a fleet of Kushan ships was under attack.
He wondered how long ago this battle had taken place. The radio
chatter they had listened to could have been traveling in space
for years. As much as he wanted to believe that the Kushan ships
he had heard were sent back for those left on Kharak, he hoped
that they had been far away when they had been attacked. Whoever
or whatever had attacked those ships had emerged the victor.
Piithik leaned back in his chair and sighed.
The news of this had certainly been kept quiet. He would have
thought that the station manager hadn't told anyone if military
officers hadn't started showing up at the station. In fact, it
was the military that requested he and the few other Naabalii on
board to help construct the computer system. That system needed
to be able to supply and refuel up to 80 corvette class vessels
in less than an hour, track up to 1000 individual targets and
assign attack vectors to them, run normal operations, and handle
emergencies. Basically, the station had turned into a jumping off
point for patrols along the asteroid rim, and that made it a
prime target.
Chapter 2
Piithik looked at the display again. It was
almost time to attend the daily meeting with the military
officers assigned to the station. He shook his head. How he hated
attending these meetings! The military had been running
simulations for the past month looking for any bugs in the
station's programming that could cause problems. Any issues
brought up by the simulations were talked about in the meetings.
Piithik wasn't the head programmer on the station and so he
rarely had the chance to say anything. He just sat there bored.
The only reason he was there in the first place was in case the
military had any questions about the computer system itself, and
that never happened. Piithik respected the military - he had, in
fact, been a part of it at one time - but he didn't put a whole
lot of confidence in their ability to run things. After all, the
military had just started taking shape again. There hadn't been
any fighting on Kharak for well over 200 years and in that time
the military had become almost like a club, and a shrinking one
at that. Discipline, tactics and hand-to-hand combat skills were
still taught in the military academies, but the chain of command
had dissolved away and now no one really knew who was in charge.
That had probably caused a lot of infighting over the last 14
months, Piithik thought. That is not what worried him most
though. What worried him the most was the fact that all the
strategies and tactics taught in the academies dealt with armed
conflict on the ground, despite the high probability that the
next one would occur in space.
A chime sounded interrupting his thoughts. The
meeting was starting. Piithik pushed a button and the display
changed to show the faces of all those that would take part in
the meeting. He noted with unease that the two officers that ran
the meetings looked grim.
"We have some news I think you should
know." one of the officers stated, skipping the usual
greetings. "This morning, one of our patrols discovered a
ship of unknown origin along the asteroid rim." A few gasps
were heard over the intercom. The officer continued "Now
there is nothing to be alarmed about," - apparently not
every one else agreed, as quite a few of the Naabalii looked
rather alarmed - "But nevertheless a squadron of
interceptors has been ordered to join us. They will be escorting
a transport here within the next two days." A diagram of the
asteroid rim popped up on the screen, replacing the faces.
"The ship was detected in roughly this
area." The second officer stated as a circle appeared on a
small section of the diagram. Piithik noted with relief that the
spot was relatively far from the station. "We don't think
that the ship carried any weapons, but it is hard to be
sure." The officer paused and took a breath. "But a
craft of that size couldn't go very far on its own without a
larger ship to support it." Nobody said a word. If the
display wasn't taking up the whole screen Piithik knew he would
be able to read the concern on their faces.
"In light of this," the first officer
said taking over again. "We advise that the Spatiik be moved
here." A dot appeared on the display indicating the position
the officer was referring to. Thankfully that position was
farther away from the spot were the unknown ship was sighted than
the station currently was.
The rest of the meeting went normally and ended
with the usual warning not to tell anyone what was discussed.
Piithik turned off his view screen, leaned back in his seat and
blew out a long breath of air. No one had suspected anything like
this would happen so soon. He wasn't much of a conversationalist
by nature, but he wished he could talk to some of the other
Naabalii on board and listen to what they thought about the
situation. He sat there mulling over what he had just heard.
Worst case scenario: the ship that had been detected was a scout.
If that was true, it probably would have already reported its
findings. It was probably lucky that the patrol had detected the
thing at all. Being a scout it would be able to nimbly maneuver
through most of the asteroids and thus elude detection or
pursuers. Best case scenario: it was a Kushan scout that was off
course and somebody got excited and thought it was something
else. Piithik doubted the officers would have moved the station
unless they were sure it wasn't something like that. A question
repeatedly entered his mind … "Now what?"
Chapter 3
Piithik stood in the forward observatory two
days later watching the transport unload. It had arrived a few
hours earlier along with its escort of 20 interceptors and five
scouts. The scouts hadn't been mentioned in the meeting and the
station commander wasn't too happy about that for some reason.
Piithik didn't know what that reason was, but it didn't concern
him at the moment. He stood admiring the scene that was spread
out before him. The transport was preparing to open its outer bay
doors. It was bigger than most he had seen, quite a bit bigger.
And to his surprise he could even see two turrets and several
sets of docking clamps. He figured the military must be really
concerned if they were sending an armed transport out. As he
watched, the bay doors opened and another ship of some kind
emerged. Maybe the term ship wasn't the right word. The thing
roughly looked like a cube, but had thrusters mounted to one
corner. As the strange box crept away from the transport, it
began to slowly unfold. He stared at it with rapt attention as
each piece folded out and locked into place. When its
transformation was complete it looked even stranger. Now it
appeared to be some kind of a communication satellite with two
boxes attached to its sides, and thrusters toward one end. The
boxes looked sort of like those used to house small rockets. It
had a communications dish and what appeared to be four solar
panels. Piithik had no idea what it was for. He couldn't figure
out why anyone would need a satellite this far from Kharak.
During his next shift in Central Command
Piithik was given a color-coded security badge. He wasn't
thrilled with the new accessory. It told him that things were
about to get a whole lot more tense around here. Once he finally
arrived in the command center Piithik sat down with a sigh. He
looked around to see who else was there. He noticed Isibaat
Manaan staring at her display. She seemed unusually focused upon
some task. Piithik walked over to her station. Apparently Isibaat
hadn't even noticed his arrival because she jumped when Piithik
spoke to her.
"Find something interesting?" he
asked.
Isibaat quickly looked around and then back at
Piithik. She appeared to be debating whether or not she should
tell him what she was doing. "I am trying to figure out what
that strange ship was." She said quickly, referring to the
ship that the transport had brought.
Piithik felt she was lying but couldn't be
sure. "What do you mean 'was'?" he inquired.
"It went into the asteroid rim with the
scouts about an hour ago." Isibaat said continuing to look
at her display. "Whatever it is, it is definitely sending
back a lot of data."
"Anything you can decipher?"
"No, not yet anyway. It's encrypted."
She sounded annoyed at all his questions, so
Piithik nodded slowly and went back to his station. Something was
going on here but he didn't have the slightest idea what it was.
About that time the station manager hurried into the center. He
seemed to take a more casual pace when he saw Piithik. He glanced
around a few times then walked over to Isibaat. They held a
hushed conversation for a few minutes and then the manager left
the room. He came back in a few moments and again had a whispered
conversation with Isibaat. Piithik wondered why he was being left
out of this, seeing as there was no one else in Central Command,
but didn't want to interrupt whatever it was that was going on.
He noticed that the station manager looked anxious. Isibaat said
something and the station manager glanced up to Piithik. He stood
looking at him for a few seconds and then motioned for Piithik to
come over to where he was. When he spoke, he did so in a low
voice.
"I guess I shouldn't keep you out of this
Piithik." He said solemnly. "Isibaat already knows
about this and I guess you should too. Now listen up. I don't
have time to explain all of this to you so I am just going to
give you the most important info. That strange ship you saw
yesterday is some kind of sensor array and relay station. It
carries a bunch of probes in those two boxes mounted on the
sides. The military is flying it through the asteroid rim as we
speak. Once on the other side it will launch those probes, which
will send data back to the sensor array, and the sensor array
will send it here.
Piithik nodded. He didn't see what the big
secret was. The military was looking for wherever the unknown
ship came from. That was perfectly logical. Knowing where it was
would provide vital information - the foremost being, as far as
Piithik was concerned, keeping the station out of harms way.
The station manager took a deep breath and
continued "Now I know it seems like the military is just
looking for the scout ship or whatever that thing was. But the
truth is they already know where it is." Piithik froze. He
was going to ask a question but the manager cut him off.
"The probes are to determine how many ships there may be and
if those ships are armed. The sensor array will then track how
ever many ships the probes find."
"And if they are armed?" Piithik
asked?
"It depends on which direction they're
headed. Only problem is that when a bunch of probes start flying
by them, those ships might just turn around and try to find out
who is watching them."
"And if they head straight for us?"
"Then the military gets to decide what it
is going to do on its own because I plan on getting the station
out of here."
"They aren't going to like that."
Piithik said.
"No they aren't." said the station
manager said testily. "The station is big, but it doesn't
have any armor or weapons and it isn't fast. I'll be damned if I
stick around for a fight!" He took a breath and looked as if
he was trying to get a hold of himself. "I don't want you to
breathe a word of this conversation to anyone Piithik. I am the
only one who is supposed to know about this. But I may need your
help in the near future and I know you are someone I can
trust."
Chapter 4
Piithik had met with the station manager and
Isibaat one more time the following day. He learned from his
"boss" - what everyone on the station called the
manager when they addressed him - that the military was giving
out sensitive information to "authorized personnel"
only, whatever that meant. Apparently the manager was considered
authorized because an officer had briefed him that morning.
Unfortunately he hadn't told Piithik anything except that the
military would need the station as a repair and refueling
platform, and that he could expect more ships to arrive within a
week. The later part of that had certainly come true. Military
vessels had arrived for several days and then suddenly stop
coming at all. Mostly they were corvettes, the mainstay of the
military's space fleet, but several squadrons of fighters also
came along. To sustain all of these ships, quite a few support
frigates had arrived as well as several assault frigates. Piithik
was sure military planners were frantically trying to learn how
to build larger, more powerful ships and were probably kicking
themselves for not having done it sooner. The lack of drive to
find new technologies after the mothership had left was coming
back to haunt them. But for now they would have to rely on the
ships they had available. All in all there were over 140
corvettes, fighters and bombers, 18 support frigates and five
assault frigates. Piithik had felt almost positive that most of
the Kharakii fleet was here.
The following day had brought an unpleasant
surprise. The station manager finally told Piithik and Isibaat
all that he had been hearing in the briefings. "I know I
haven't been very forthcoming with information lately." he
had said. "But I don't want the military to get suspicious.
As you know, last week the probes were launched to discover how
many ships were in that unknown fleet and if any of them were
armed." The manger's voice had trembled, "Well, I was
told that there were at least 15 ships, of varying sizes, but
most were bigger than the station. They didn't tell me if they
were armed or not, but I am assuming that they are, because if
they weren't, I know the military would have been sure to tell me
there was nothing to worry about." That was not good news.
The station, though not much bigger than an assault frigate, was
still the biggest ship out here. "What's worse," the
station manager had bleated "is that they stopped when they
detected our probes and now they are just sitting there."
A chill ran through Piithik. That had been days
ago, and since then nothing had happened. It was almost as if one
side was waiting for the other to move. He remembered his boss
telling him that the unknown fleet probably didn't know where
they were. The asteroid rim was supposedly dense enough that it
would clutter up their displays and keep the Kharakii fleet
hidden. Piithik thought there was a little too much at stake to
make such a supposition, but then he wasn't the one making the
decisions. There really wasn't anything to do now except wait.
And he was getting sick of this waiting.
A voice suddenly came over the intercom
"All operations personnel please report to the command
center. All operations personnel please report to the command
center." Piithik was the systems engineer and thus was part
of operations. He donned his uniform and headed toward Central
Command. When he got there he shot the station manager a
questioning look.
"The fleet is moving." Was all he got
for a reply.
"About time." Piithik whispered under
his breath.
A chart of the asteroid rim was on the main
view screen. Piithik studied the path that the fleet was supposed
to follow. It went along the asteroid rim away from the sensor
array…and from Kharak. He looked at his boss again
questioningly, but got no response. He saw Isibaat at
communications. She gave him an uneasy look and went back to
work.
After the station was well underway, Piithik
motioned for Isibaat to follow him. She handed over her headset
to someone else and trailed Piithik out the door. He didn't have
to say anything to her before she spoke up. "The other fleet
is moving." He immediately knew what she was talking about.
"Which direction?" he asked.
"Toward the sensor array." Isibaat
responded. "According to the boss, the military thinks that
they are trying to communicate with it."
"With the array?"
"Yes. They probably don't know what it is
yet."
"I wonder what they will do when they find
out?" Piithik said, mostly to himself. Isibaat gave him a
worried look. "Has the military tried to talk back?"
"No." was all she could say.
"Is there anyway they could use the array
to find out where we are?"
"I don't know, I certainly hope not. The
last thing we all want is a standoff."
Piithik could think of something he wanted less
than that.
Chapter 5
The following hours passed slowly. Piithik sat
at his station long after his shift was over. He looked around.
Just about every space available in Central Command was filled
with crewmembers, most sitting on the floor, but some still
standing. This was technically a breach of the recently ordained
security measures given by the military. But the station manager
felt that everyone aboard was in this, and so they might as well
know what was going on. Piithik knew all those here were waiting
for some kind of news from the flagship "Vruulajt" but
so far there had only been silence. There was some light chatter
going on in the command center, but most were either staring
blankly in front of them or trying to get some sleep. They had
little else to do. No transmissions were allowed to Kharak and
the mining of asteroids had been suspended until further notice.
Piithik's thoughts turned toward Kharak. He felt sure that the
military would have given some kind of announcement back home by
now. After all, the asteroid rim was at the very edge of their
solar system. Should the unknown fleet decide to come through, it
probably wouldn't take them long to find Kharak. He imagined what
would happen when that announcement was given. Panic? Despair?
Anger? He assumed many would see the error of their ways. See
that the they had wasted all this time waiting for those that had
gone to Hiigara to come back and take them away, when they should
have been planning, building, advancing. He just hoped it wasn't
too late.
It had been almost 10 hours since the unknown
fleet was supposed to reach the sensor array, when someone
shouted, "Look!" All eyes turned toward the main
viewscreen. Barely visible in the lower left-hand corner, five
scouts were seen leaving their docks on a support frigate. The
station manager issued a command and the viewscreen centered on
the scouts and followed them till they went out of site. The
scouts were headed in the direction from which the fleet had just
come. The chatter grew in the command center until the manger had
to shout and tell everyone to quiet down. It was then that
Piithik noticed that Isibaat was talking with someone over the
comm.
She looked at the station manager and said
"It's vice admiral Roak Sjet aboard the Vruulajt. He is
going to give a fleet wide address."
"Put him on the loud speaker." The
station manager ordered. Isibaat did as she was told. For several
seconds there was just static, and then a booming voice spoke.
"As no doubt many of you have seen,"
the vice admiral said, "five scouts were launched a few
minutes ago. These scouts were sent to intercept an unknown craft
that has emerged from the asteroid rim." No one said a word.
Piithik was not sure that some of them were even breathing.
"We believe this craft to be nothing more than a probe.
Unfortunately we do not know the capabilities of this probe and
so we must not let it pass by. Our only option is to destroy it.
Yes, this action may give our unknown friends the idea that we
are hostile. But we cannot allow them to discover Kharak."
Piithik was finding it hard to breathe himself. He knew that by
destroying the probe, it would only increase the chance that a
fight could break out. The vice admiral continued "This is
obviously a very chancy move. We have no idea what kind of
response our actions could bring. In light of this, I want to put
all combat craft on a condition yellow. I will make sure more
information is given to you all when it becomes available to us.
That is all."
The transmission ended. The station manager was
the first to speak "Isibaat, can we listen in on the scout's
communications?" Everyone in the room turned to look at her.
She shook her head.
"Not unless they are operating on the general communication
frequencies." She said. "And that is highly unlikely
considering the nature of the mission."
"Great," the station manager said
sarcastically, "out of all the ships in these fleet, we are
the only ones who can't listen in on what is going on."
It didn't take long to figure out what had
happened though. Within a few minutes the scouts returned, one of
them doing a victory roll. Piithik did not see many smiles.
Everyone was aware what might happen now, and being on the only
unarmed ship in this fleet wasn't a position most wanted to be
in.
"Alright everyone, listen up." The
station manager said over the intercom. "I am going to start
organizing all of us into details within our normal shifts. I
want all of us to know what we are supposed to do in case of an
emergency. I may be calling upon some of you to fulfill duties
that you are not used to. I will try to put you in areas you are
familiar with but that may not happen. I expect each of us to do
our best over the next few days. Now I want all of you not on the
night shift to go get some sleep."
Most of the crewmembers in the control room
started slowly filing out. Piithik joined them. He was glad that
the station manager was giving them something to do. It was
better than sitting around contemplating what could happen in the
near future. He had never really thought much of the station
manager's abilities until recently. Now he was glad to have
someone like him in charge.
Chapter 6
The following day was a busy one. The station
was humming with activity. An overhaul was being done on the
stations propulsion system, mechanics were busily working on the
resource collectors, and the station manager had damage control
teams being trained. There was an atmosphere of tension in the
station, but despite that, everyone seemed relatively calm.
Piithik entered the command center bleary eyed
from a restless sleep. He looked around and saw with some
satisfaction that he wasn't the only one who looked tired. Just
about every one in Central Command looked like they had had
trouble sleeping. The station manager looked particularly
exhausted. He sat slouched in his chair, his uniform disheveled,
his face bleak, his eyes staring blankly off into space. Piithik
watched the former shift leave. They walked off wearily, giving
each other a nervous look as if they shared some uncomfortable
secret. Just watching them, he knew something had happened.
"May I have your attention please."
The station manager said in a solemn voice over the ship-wide
intercom. All over the station work stopped. An eerie silence
replaced the usual morning noises as everyone focused their
attention on what the manager was going to say. "Early this
morning another probe passed through the asteroid rim. The
military sent some scouts to intercept and destroy it as before.
Unfortunately, not everything always works as planned. The scouts
were ambushed by some unknown craft and one of them was
destroyed. A group of interceptors was launched to help deal with
the threat but before they could reach the area the unknown
attackers had retreated back into the asteroid rim. The
interceptors then chased down and destroyed the probe. According
to a statement issued by Vice Admiral Roak this morning, we are
to consider all unidentified craft hostile until further notice.
All military forces have been placed on high alert. In accordance
with law, the station has been placed under direct control of the
military."
Piithik looked around. Everyone in the room had
a stunned look. He could almost feel the weight of the situation
pressing against his chest. "Vice Admiral Roak has assured
me that he will try to integrate his people and ours
seamlessly." The station manager continued. "Effective
immediately, four officers will be assigned to the station. Until
they get here, I will remain in direct control of this ship. Once
the officers are on board, I will turn my command over to them.
However, should the military place this station directly in harms
way, I will override this decision." - Piithik didn't think
that last part was in accordance with law, but it brought a smile
to his face anyhow - "Should I be forced to take such action
I will need your help. I know there are several different Kiith
on this vessel, but from this moment we need to act all as one
Kiith. We will need each other to survive. That is all."
Piithik looked around him again. He saw the stunned looks of
those in the room slowly fade into looks of determination. No one
spoke as they went back to work.
It only took a couple of hours for the military
officers to arrive. Two of them Piithik remembered as giving the
weekly briefings. He had seen them only a week ago but it seemed
a lifetime. "I don't suppose you are here to give the weekly
briefing are you?" said the station manager dryly.
"No sir." Said one of the officers.
That was really all that needed to be said. The station manager
gestured for them to follow him and left the command center.
Piithik wasn't sure he liked having the military running the
ship. Still, he was glad that he knew two of the officers. He
hoped it would make things more comfortable for everyone on
board. He looked at the main viewscreen. He could see some
fighters and corvettes practicing. The corvettes were escorting a
supply frigate and the fighters were trying to attack it. Piithik
was not sure how the craft knew when they were destroyed, but
from time to time he would see them leaving the mock battle and
not returning.
Over the next several hours Piithik was busy
monitoring the automatic docking procedures. Many of the fighters
and corvettes that needed refueling would come to the station so
that they could get used to the different docking procedures. He
was glad to see that the computer system was working perfectly.
He took the opportunity several times to chat with some of the
pilots as they docked. Most of them didn't seem like they wanted
to talk, but a few would tell him about their jobs. He figured
that they were probably all shocked by what had happened the
previous night and rightly so. The scout pilot who had died out
there was one of them.
Towards the end of his shift the station
manager re-entered Central Command with the four officers
trailing him. One of the officers that Piithik didn't know went
over and turned on the ship-wide intercom. "Crew to
emergency stations. Crew to emergency stations. This is a
drill." The officer repeated the command a few more times
and then waited for each emergency team to report in that they
were ready. It took a total of 6 minutes for all the teams to
report. The officer looked at the station manager. "The
response time needs to be cut in half by the end of the
week." He said grimly. The manager nodded slowly. Piithik
figured he would be happy if he even lived to see the end of the
week.
Chapter 7
Piithik was jolted awake by the sound of a
voice over the intercom. " … three alert. This is a
level three alert. All crewmembers report to your emergency
stations. This is not a drill. All crewmembers report to your
emergency stations. This is not a drill. I repeat, this is a
level three…" Piithik hastily put on his uniform as the
alert continued to give out instructions. He looked at the time
and was thankful to see that he had been able to sleep for
several hours. As soon as he was done he rushed toward the
command center. The passageways were crammed with others trying
to get to their emergency stations. Piithik was amazed that he
was one of the first to arrive. The station manager was there but
the four military officers assigned to the station were
noticeably absent. Piithik waited while the rest of the
operations team hurried in. When they were all assembled the
station manager spoke.
"A few minutes ago several ships began
emerging from the asteroid rim." The station manager
motioned toward the main view screen and paused for a few seconds
so that everyone could look. Piithik could see what appeared to
be a group of nine or ten ships sitting motionless along the
asteroid rim. If it were not for the sun glinting off their hulls
he probably wouldn't be able to see them at all. "Since they
emerged they have maintained their position. The fleet has been
put on condition red, but so far no interceptors or corvettes
have launched. The officers assigned to this station are
currently in a fleet wide briefing. Since we aren't military
personnel we get left in the dark." The station manager said
testily.
"Now what?" the station's navigator
asked.
"We wait and see what happens. Now
everybody get to your stations. I am going to try and get us
something to eat. We could be here for a while." The manager
then exited the command room. Everyone just looked at each other
dazed, and then slowly took their positions. For a few seconds no
one spoke a word as the realization of what could happen settled
in. Then a few quiet conversations broke out. Piithik looked up
toward Isibaat. She was staring at her console looking deep in
thought.
A few minutes later the station manager
returned. With him was only one of the officers, apparently the
senior one. Unfortunately it wasn't one of the two that Piithik
knew. The manager spoke "This is Captain Noraak Sjet. He
will be giving the orders now, so listen to him. I want your full
cooperation, as we can't afford to have any insubordination
now."
The captain donned a headset and sat in the
command chair. He didn't look very comfortable but Piithik
attributed it to nerves. Another officer joined him a few seconds
later and reported that their companions were in Propulsion. The
captain nodded. "Ship status." He asked.
Piithik looked at his display. One half showed
the condition of the station's systems and the other tracked
ships in the immediate vicinity. "The station is fully
operational. All systems are nominal." He said.
"All emergency teams have reported in.
Communications are open." Isibaat said in a business like
tone.
"Fusion drive is functioning
normally" a voice from Propulsion reported.
"Very well." Captain Noraak said.
Piithik focused on his tracking display. On it
he was able to see the position of most of his fleet and some
parts of the asteroid rim. While he was panning around the fleet
someone nearly yelled, "They're moving!"
Piithik looked at the main view screen. The
fleet of ships had suddenly lit up. He could see their navigation
lights flashing and other lights illuminating their hulls.
"Any word from fleet command?" he heard the captain ask
Isibaat.
"None yet." She said shakily.
As Piithik watched, the other fleet started
changing formation. The ships started lining up vertically and
horizontally in a square like pattern. He could see now that
there were eleven ships total.
The fleet address system suddenly crackled to
life. "All ships, man your battle stations! All ships man
your battle stations! Stand by to launch all corvettes and
interceptors."
When the other fleet had finished changing
formation, they were stacked in a square four high and three
wide, with the top row having one less ship. Piithik could see a
bluish light start to emit from one of the ships in the center.
"Zoom in on the bluish ship." Captain
Noraak said.
The display zoomed in. The bluish ship appeared
to be a transport of some kind, but it was huge. Piithik could
see several smaller ships launching out of it. The hair on his
arms began to bristle as he realized what was happening.
Chapter 8
"Launch all fighters and corvettes! Launch
all fighters and corvettes!" the Vice Admiral nearly
screamed over the fleet-wide address. Piithik watched,
enraptured, as the small ships started dropping off the support
frigates and assumed formation. They streaked toward the incoming
swarm of small craft.
Suddenly a strange sounding voice boomed over
the stations comm system. ""We Taiidan. Put down your
defense and surrender. If you do, we will not damage you or your
space ships. If you do not, we will hurt your bodies." If
the message did not have such terrifying implications, Piithik
felt he would have burst out laughing at it.
"Comm! Cut that off." The captain
ordered.
"Done." Replied Isibaat.
"Systems. Can you tell me how many enemy
ships there are?" Captain Novaak said to Piithik.
"No sir, they are still out of range. I
won't have that information for you until they are within the
boundaries of the fleet." Piithik answered.
"Very well. Give me a number when you are
able."
"Yes sir."
Piithik looked at the main view screen again.
It was obvious that the group of Taiidan craft rushing in were
tremendously outnumbered. But come they did. The Kharakii
fighters and corvettes waited for them at the very edge of the
fleet. And then the two groups collided into an indistinguishable
swarm of twisting and turning ships. The battle was too far away
and the craft too small to be able to tell exactly what was going
on. Piithik saw a few Taiidan craft break from the fight and head
into the Kharakii fleet. They began firing on the support
frigates and whatever else came into their sites. He looked at
his tracking display. "Six Taiidan craft have broken off
from the main battle and have headed into the fleet sir."
Piithik relayed to the captain.
"Understood." Was all the captain
said in reply.
In a minute's time, one of the Taiidan ships
had been destroyed and one was in trouble, spiraling out of
control. The rest turned to try and escape from the fleet but
were cut off by two multi-gun corvettes, which rapidly tore them
to shreds. It appeared the battle was going well. Piithik noticed
that the few surviving Taiidan craft were starting to flee back
toward their fleet. The Kharakii interceptors were pursuing while
the corvettes continued guarding the forward edge of the fleet.
The entire fight had taken only ten minutes and it appeared that
the Kushan had won an overwhelming victory. Cheers erupted in the
command center.
"Settle down people!" Captain Novaak
barked. "It isn't over yet."
Another look at the main view screen confirmed
this. Piithik could see two groups of bombers heading toward the
Taiidan fleet. The interceptors formed up with them as an escort.
The Taiidan vessels, which had continued to close on the Kharakii
fleet during the fighter battle, made no attempt to turn around.
Instead they plowed resolutely ahead. Piithik was awed at the
size of the ships. The smallest of them were the same size as an
assault frigate and the largest was around twice as big as the
station. The command center filled with tension once again.
As the bombers approached, two of the larger
vessels suddenly unleashed a huge volley of missiles. The
interceptors and bombers twisted and turned, desperately trying
to get out of the way. But the missiles caught most of them,
damaging or destroying nearly a third of the assault force.
Everyone in the command center looked at the viewscreen in
horror, their eyes staring in disbelief. Still, to Piithik it
looked as if there were enough craft to seriously hurt the
Taiidan fleet. The interceptors dived toward the fighter-carrier
and began strafing it. But inexplicably, the bullets didn't seem
to be hitting it. "Can we zoom in on that?" the captain
asked. The main viewscreen zoomed in on the carrier. Piithik
could see the tracer fire rip through space and then bounce away
as if it had skipped off the surface of something. A few of the
rounds managed to get through, but most of them ricocheted away
harmlessly. Some kind of field was protecting the carrier. The
interceptors continued strafing but for the most part the Taiidan
seemed to ignore the attacks. Rather their ships plodded on
toward the Kharakii fleet.
One group of bombers focused on a large Taiidan
vessel that had huge turrets and what looked like spines along
its "back." The turrets ravaged the bombers as they
flew straight over the ship, but fortunately most of the bombers
were able to drop their loads on the behemoth before being
destroyed. To Piithik, it appeared to be a lost cause. The ship
was too big and missiles and turret fire were bringing down
strike craft far too rapidly for them to destroy it before it
reached the Kharakii fleet. He also knew that the assault
wouldn't be able to last much longer before ships would need to
start refueling. A bright flash caught his eye. The surviving
bombers had regrouped and had targeted what appeared to be a
frigate. The frigate had evidently been damaged enough that it
had been forced to drop out of formation and was being left
behind by the main body of the Taiidan fleet. Bombers and
interceptors were swarming all over it. Another huge explosion
rocked the frigate, and then the whole thing was engulfed in a
bright flash - the explosion blowing it apart and sending debris
hurtling in all directions.
Piithik felt a growing anxiety rise up in his
throat. The two fleets were almost on top of each other. Soon
there would be direct ship-to-ship fire. He looked nervously at
the captain, hoping he would order the station out of the area.
But the captain only stared at the viewscreen. Piithik looked
back in time to see the first shots being fired between the
larger ships of the two fleets. The Vruulajt led the charge for
the Kharakii fleet. Suddenly a huge beam shot out from a
frigate-sized Taiidan vessel. It smashed into the side of a
support frigate, blowing a huge hole in the ship. It was joined
by another beam and in less than a minute the support frigate
exploded. Piithik stared open-mouthed at the sight. More beams
shot from the Taiidan fleet hitting assault and support frigates.
A support frigate near the station launched a contingent of four
repair corvettes. They raced toward damaged vessels in an effort
to repair them.
A few of the returning interceptors and
corvettes began docking with the station. The computer system
automatically guided them in and set about refueling them.
Suddenly Piithik heard a crackle over the comm.
"Mayday! Mayday! This is echo wing to the Spatiik. We have
run out of fuel. Request assistance." The sudden
communication sounded loud in the nearly silent room.
"What is your position, Echo wing."
The captain asked.
After Echo wing had relayed their position the
captain brought it up on the view screen. There, in the midst of
some of the heaviest fighting sat four interceptors, motionless.
Piithik was amazed at how calmly they had asked for assistance in
light of their situation. He shook his head. There was no way the
station could get to them before they were destroyed. And even if
they could, the station would be an easy target.
The captain opened his mouth. What Piithik
expected to hear and what Captain Novaak said were two different
things. "Navigation, set a course for those
interceptors." The captain said grimly. Piithik froze in
shock.
"WHAT!" the station manger yelled
jumping out of his chair. "Navigation, ignore that
order!" He turned to the captain. "What the hell are
you doing?" he demanded, trying to keep control of his
temper.
Captain Novaak looked calmly at the station
commander. "Navigation. Plot a course for those ships and
don't listen to your boss. He is not in charge here." he
said sternly.
The station manager took a deep breath,
swallowed and then looked directly past Captain Novaak and his
aid at Piithik. He nodded, and said slowly "I am afraid I
can't let you do that captain. If we go in there we will be
destroyed and all of us on this station will die. We will never
even make it to echo wing. Our deaths will be for nothing. I
admire your courage, but I will not allow the station to go into
harm's way." Piithik got the hint.
The navigator sat staring at the pair still
indecisive on what to do. The captain practically hissed his
orders. "Lithuus, arrest this man. Navigator, set in a
course for those fighters. Those are my comrades out there and I
will not let them die!" The aid pulled out his sidearm and
walked toward the station manager. Piithik slowly bent down and
picked up a combustion extinguisher sitting beside his station.
Captain Novaak and his aid both had their backs to him and he had
to take advantage of that. He cautiously crept toward the
captain. Isibaat saw what he was doing and spoke to the
navigator.
"If you take us in there you will be
wasting the lives of everyone on this station. We cannot save
those people."
The navigator nodded his head. He then turned
his back on the captain. Piithik was raising the extinguisher
just as the captain began to stride toward navigation. He quickly
swung it downward, barely hitting the back of Novaak's head. The
captain stumbled forward, grunting in surprise and pain. A shot
rang out. Piithik spun around, half expecting to feel a searing
pain tear through him. Instead he saw that the station manager
had turned and rushed the aid, but the aid had been able to bring
up his weapon in time and fire it. Piithik couldn't see if the
round hit the manager or not, but if it did, it did not stop his
charge. He smashed into the aid and both of them went sprawling
onto the floor. Piithik looked back toward the captain in time to
see him get up and reach for his own side arm. Piithik swung the
extinguisher and connected with the side of Novaak's head. The
officer crumpled to the ground unconscious. When he turned around
again he saw that the navigator had pulled the aid off the
station manager and was trying to restrain him. The captain
crawled toward the command chair, his fingers clutching his
chest. Piithik could see blood dripping from his hands. In a
strange mixture of near panic and anger Piithik picked up the
aid's fallen side arm and pointed it at its former owner.
"If you so much as twitch, a hole is going to be where your
face was." He hissed. The aid ceased struggling. After a
moments thought, Piithik gave the weapon to the navigator.
"Take him to one of the cargo bins and lock him up." As
soon as they turned, Piithik picked up the combustion
extinguisher and cracked it over the back of the aid's head. The
officer fell to the floor. Everyone in the command center stared
at Piithik in shock. He hoped he hadn't killed the aid but he was
too busy to worry about it now. He whispered to the Navigator,
"Sorry, we don't have time for you to be escorting
prisoners. Now go back to your station." Piithik used the
officer's uniforms to tie them up, while Isibaat helped the
station manager up and led him to the command chair. He sat for a
second to catch his breath. Blood was running over his fingers
and on to his uniform. He flipped on the ship-wide intercom.
"Propulsion. Don't question what I am about to tell
you." He paused. "Place the two military officers with
you in restraints." He flipped off the intercom without
waiting for a reply.
Piithik looked back at the main viewscreen to
see what was happening in the battle. He could see that most of
the Kharakii fleet had been destroyed. Several Taiidan vessels
were gone as well. A few support frigates could be seen speeding
toward the asteroid rim. Piithik scanned the battle for the
Vruulajt, figuring that if it were destroyed then all semblance
of an organized retreat would be out of the question. He saw it
limping toward the damaged Taiidan carrier. When the frigate
didn't turn away, he knew what was about to happen. He watched in
horror as the frigate plowed into the carrier causing them both
to explode in a brilliant white flash. Several Taiidan
interceptors flew by the station. Piithik knew they would soon be
in the thick of the battle. "Navigation." the station
manager said, "Head toward the asteroid rim. Isibaat, try
and see if we can get any other ships to follow us.
Suddenly the station shook violently. Piithik
raced back to his seat and checked the station's systems for
damage. "We lost the long range communications array."
He reported grimly. He looked at his tracking system, trying to
find what attacked them. He could see one of the beam-firing
frigates approaching. Piithik focused the main viewscreen on it.
"If that thing gets to us, we are in big trouble." He
said.
"ETA to the asteroid rim." The
captain asked hoarsely.
"Four minutes, thirty-eight seconds."
The navigator responded.
The captain flipped on the intercom.
"Resource collector crews to your ships. I repeat, resource
collector crews to your ships." He turned the intercom off.
"I have try and save as many people as I can." He
muttered to himself.
Piithik's eyes continued to watch the approach
of the enemy frigate. It appeared intent on attacking them.
Isibaat spoke up. "I've got two support frigates to follow
us out. They have some interceptors and corvettes with them that
they are going to launch at that ship." She said, gesturing
at the frigate on the viewscreen. Piithik looked at his tracking
display. The interceptors appeared nimble enough to keep out of
the way of the light-beam the frigate fired at them. Even though
they weren't doing much damage, it was delaying the frigate and
buying the station precious time. Isibaat spoke again, this time
in a shaky voice. "I am getting a distress call from the
support frigates headed toward the asteroid rim. They say it's a
trap. There are four Taiidan vessels waiting for us there."
Piithik heard the navigator swear in a voice that sounded close
to panic. The rest of the crew in the command center sat silent
in dismay.
"There is no way out of it then, is there?
The station manager said in a near whisper. He looked around at
the faces of everyone in the room, then spoke into his headset.
"All resource collectors, you are free to launch. All
resource collectors, you are free to launch. May Sajuuk be with
you." He paused. Piithik could tell he was having trouble
breathing. "Navigation, stay on course for the asteroid rim.
How long have we got?"
"Three minutes, twelve seconds."
An enemy fighter strafed the station. Piithik
could hear the bullets rip through the hull. The far away sound
of escaping gas let him know air was leaking from the station. An
alarm went off. "Automatic Decompression Response
initiated." The computer said in a low voice. Emergency
doors closed over Central Command's two entrances, sealing the
crew inside. Piithik looked sadly at the station manager. There
would be no way to get him to the infirmary now. The Taiidan
fighter was turning to make a second run, when one of the
resource collectors the station had launched moved in close to
it. The fighter changed its course to attack the collector, but
never got off a shot. The resource collector turned on its Phased
Disassembler Array and the fighter practically dissolved. Piithik
was struck speechless in amazement. He tried giving a victory
yell, but he couldn't make a sound. The resource collector then
turned away from the asteroid rim and headed back toward the
station. Another one followed it back. The remaining two made
straight for the asteroid rim.
All was silent in the command center. Isibaat
had a first aid kit and was trying to patch up the station
manager's wound. Piithik continued looking at his tracking
display. The main battle was all but over behind them. The
Taiidan were cleaning up the last few ships still offering
resistance. Ahead of them a smaller battle was raging. The four
support frigates that had made it to the edge of the asteroid rim
were giving the enemy a tough fight. They had destroyed one of
the enemy frigates and damaged the two others, but still had to
contend with the larger ship. Piithik knew they would soon be
destroyed unless they were able to evade the enemy and get into
the asteroid rim somehow. But even if they were destroyed, some
good would come out of it - the fight they had given had drawn
the four Taiidan vessels away, giving the station a chance to
escape. Piithik was relieved to see two of the resource
collectors enter the asteroid rim and disappear from his tracking
display. The remaining two stayed with the station.
"ETA" the station manager wheezed,
painfully. A timer was on the main viewscreen giving just that
information.
"One minute, forty-two seconds." The
navigator said, confused. Piithik knew what was happening. The
manager was losing his vision; he would not live much longer.
The beam-firing frigate that had tried to attack the station
earlier was still coming toward them. Piithik studied it. The
frigate appeared to be somewhat damaged, but was ignoring the
interceptors and corvettes in an all out attempt to get to the
station. The computer estimated it would be in firing range about
thirty seconds before the station entered the asteroid rim. The
two support frigates fell out of formation with the station in
order to engage the enemy ship, but it ignored them as well. This
did not look good. Unexpectedly, the two resource collectors fell
back toward the Taiidan frigate as well. "What is going
on?" Piithik whispered to himself. He wondered if there was
something wrong with the communications as he was unable to talk
with the collectors to find out what they were doing. Just then
the enemy ship fired, hitting one of the resource collectors. He
was amazed that it wasn't destroyed. He looked at the main
viewscreen. The asteroid rim loomed dead ahead, drawing ever
closer. Piithik looked back at the tracking display. One minute
to go. He changed the main view screen to show the asteroid rim
on one side and the approaching enemy ship on the other. All eyes
in the command center focused on the images. In the right hand
corner, the timer dwindled down past 30 seconds. Piithik
instinctively grabbed onto the arms of his chair as he waited for
the enemy ship to fire. The station suddenly shook violently.
Sparks showered from the lights as they exploded. Debris shot
across the room cutting Piithik's arms and face and toppling him
from his chair. The navigator was thrown from his seat. The
ceiling collapsed in several places crushing those below it. And
then the shaking stopped. The room went dark and with the
darkness came silence. Piithik could smell smoke and hear the pop
of shorting electric cables. A few of the emergency lights came
on. He crawled over to his station and looked at his systems
display. He was sure that the station would not survive the next
shot. His display showed a gaping hole at the bottom of the
Spatiik where some of the crew quarters had been. Piithik hoped
there was no one in them, while at the same time realizing that
it probably didn't make any difference as they all would be dead
soon anyhow. He looked at his tracking display. It was flickering
badly, but he could make out the enemy frigate being attacked -
by a resource collector. He blinked and looked again. It was the
same resource collector that had destroyed the Taiidan fighter.
It had turned on its Phased Disassembler Array as it silently
closed on the enemy ship. It appeared the frigate knew what was
about to happen as it tried to dodge the collector but it was too
late. They collided a second later. Both ships exploded into an
orange fireball, flinging twisted metal in all directions.
Piithik hoped it would be the last sacrifice he would ever have
to see.
He looked at the main viewscreen. It showed
nothing but static.
Smoke drifted through the command center.
Piithik slowly turned around, truely taking the scene in for
first time since early that morning. How things had changed!
Where there had once been a fully operational Central Command,
there now was a mess of strewn wiring, smashed equipment, and
shattered glass. He could still hear the crackle of electricity
as it sparked along some severed electrical cables. He could
faintly see Isibaat weeping, her head in her hands, through the
haze of bluish smoke. The station shuddered again. Another small
chunk of asteroid must have hit them, Piithik thought as he gazed
at the destruction. They were lucky to be alive. Somehow they had
been able to escape into the asteroid rim. But even with luck on
their side it had cost them dearly. If it hadn't been for the
brave crew of that resource collector the station would be
nothing more than lifeless wreckage. He looked at the barely
functioning navigational display. They were safe for now. He had
managed to plot a course between the bigger asteroids where it
should be fairly clear of debris. Amazingly, it didn't appear
that any Taiidan were following them. Piithik hoped that somehow
some other ships from the fleet had escaped besides the two that
were following the station through the asteroid rim. But even if
they had he wasn't sure how they were going to find them. The
whole reason they had gone into the asteroid rim in the first
place was because it cluttered up the tracking display so bad,
thus making it nearly impossible to track a ship.
Piithik went over to the navigator, the only
other surviving member of the operations team besides Isibaat and
himself. He was still unconscious, with a nasty cut on the side
of his head, but appeared to be breathing steadily. Piithik had
already done everything he could for him. The three of them were
trapped in Central Command until the emergency teams could
pressurize the main hull. And he didn't know how long that was
going to be.
Piithik went over to Isibaat to check on how
she was doing. She appeared to be ok physically, though she had
been crying off and on ever since they had reached safety. That
had been hours ago. Piithik put his hand on her shoulder. She
turned to look at him for a second, tears in her eyes. She had
tried several times to talk to him during the course of those
hours, but she had never managed to speak a word before a new
wave of sorrow would wash over her. Piithik knew there was
nothing he could do for her. A lot of her Kiith had died today,
many of whom she was very close to. Only time could heal those
wounds.
Piithik sat down in the command chair. He had
never sat in it before but there was no reason not to now. For
all practical purposes he was in command. After all, the station
manager was dead, as was Captain Novaak and his aid. Piithik
wondered if the two officers who used to run the weekly meetings
were still alive. He had talked to the Propulsion team after the
station had entered the asteroid rim but they had said nothing
about the officers, except that they had been captured without a
struggle.
Piithik leaned back in the chair, letting images of the day flash
through his mind. He thought back to the start of the battle when
the Taiidan had demanded the fleet's surrender. It had been a
simple message. One that showed that they had not quite mastered
the Kushanii language, though Piithik knew it was better than
anyone on Kharak could have done if they had tried to speak the
Taiidan dialect. He wondered if the strange communications they
had intercepted almost two weeks ago originated from the Taiidan.
For all he knew those bastards had destroyed the ships sent back
from Hiigara to rescue those on Kharak. Of course, that was
assuming the mothership had ever reached Hiigara. He was
beginning to question that more and more now.
Piithik's mind drifted back to the problems at
hand. There were certainly a lot of them. The long-range
communications array had been destroyed, which meant that they
couldn't send a message to Kharak. Ship-to-ship communications
were unreliable at best; making it hard to talk and coordinate
with the two support frigates that had come with them. The
tracking and navigational systems were badly damaged, life
support was shorting out in some parts of the station, the
docking facilities had no power, and a gaping hole was were the
crew quarters used to be. The station needed some serious
repairs. Piithik new they could eventually repair it themselves
but it would take a lot of time to do that. And right now that
time was being used to put distance between the Taiidan fleet and
themselves.
Piithik felt confident that they would be able
to return to Kharak if they could only remain undetected while
they made repairs. They still had one remaining resource
collector to gather material, though it was pretty banged up. So
far the other two collectors that had entered the asteroid rim
before the station had not been heard from. He hoped that they
would run into them somehow, and soon. The station could build
another collector if necessary, but they didn't have a crew to
pilot it.
Piithik leaned forward and tried to clear his
mind. There would be plenty of time to worry about all of this
later. Right now he just wanted to think about those that had not
made it this far - the station manager, Captain Novaak, the crew
of that resource collector - and wonder why it was that he had
been allowed to survive.
- PART II
- Chapter 10
Two weeks had passed since the run in with the
Taiidan. Piithik sat in the command chair, his head supported by
his hand. It was late at night. The second shift operations crew
would be heading out pretty soon he thought, their time in
Central Command over for the night. He had had trouble sleeping
as of late and he found the command center as good a place as any
to wait until exhaustion overtook him. Little anxieties
continuously nipped at his mind, making him restless. When the
station had been under repair there had been plenty of things to
do to keep him busy. But now the repairs were wrapping up and the
crew was waiting expectantly for him to take some course of
action. The longer he waited to make a decision, the more
unsettled they would become. He knew they just could not sit out
here in the asteroid rim forever.
Piithik was sure that most of those on board
wanted to head straight for Kharak. So did he for that matter.
But the Taiidan were still looking for them, according to the
commanding officers of the support frigates, and they had blocked
off that route. Piithik knew they could never outrun the Taiidan
and they would probably only lead the Taiidan right to Kharak if
they tried.
If they stayed in the asteroid rim the Taiidan
would eventually find them. The captains of the support frigates
had said as much. The Taiidan were slowly drawing a noose around
the group and soon escape would be impossible. They could try to
hide but he knew that unless the Taiidan had some solid hope of
finding them they would have given up the search already.
This only left one option - to go in the
opposite direction, away from the asteroid rim and Kharak. This
certainly was not a good idea since they would be losing all
cover, but something had to be done and soon. Piithik was
beginning to regret being in command. At one time he knew he had
dreamed of being in charge of a vessel this size. But that was
before any of the recent events had taken place. Now he was stuck
with the position, though he knew it was his own fault. He had
taken responsibility for the station after the manager had died,
and in all the commotion after the battle he had not given anyone
else the chance to take charge. Now everyone just assumed he was
in command. He wished he could dump all the tough decisions onto
someone else and still be in control, but that was not how it
worked.
Piithik reluctantly forced his mind to stop
wandering and focus on the problem at hand. Kharak was on the far
side of the sun right now, so it was safe from discovery for a
while. It would be another four months before it reached its
closest point relative to the station's current position and by
that time he hoped to be long gone. The thought of heading out
into the void frightened him somewhat. No one really knew what
was out there. But he couldn't think about that. He knew the
station had to be clear of Taiidan sensor range by the time they
emerged on the other side of the asteroid rim. He would be sure
to contact the military offices tomorrow morning and see what
they had to say. He hoped they had some other plan. Not that he
would really trust the military's guidance anymore. His
experiences with them during the battle had not instilled much
faith in him of their leadership abilities. That meant he would
have to trust his own judgement and perhaps take his chances
alone, leaving the two support frigates to make their own way.
Not something he wanted to do, but it had to be considered
none-the-less.
The following morning was a busy one for
Piithik. After touring the station - checking to see how the
final repairs were coming - he sent a transmission to the two
support frigates stating that he needed to talk to their
respective captains. The meeting turned out to be a long one.
Piithik was dismayed to find that the captains could think of no
other options for getting out of the predicament they were in. At
Piithik's suggestion that the only choice left was to head away
from the asteroid rim and Kharak, the officers nodded grimly.
They seemed much more prepared to face the situation than he had
been the night before. He could do so now only after a good
nights sleep. That was the strange thing about sleep, Piithik
thought. It had a way of making you accept the inevitable.
It took a while to work out a reasonable plan
for escape. But when it was done, Piithik had a whole new respect
for the captains. The two of them were from the same Kiith though
they had not known each other until after the battle with the
Taiidan. One was named Tuulof Sjet and the other Indec Sjet. Both
had been in the military since before the departure of the
Mothership. Tuulof had actually been selected as one of the crew
of the Mothership. But an incident involving a member of the
Kiith Gaalsien, which had made several attempts at sabotaging the
hyperdrive project, had left him wounded and unable to make the
journey. A huge scar on his face marked the encounter.
The plan was so simple and elegant that for the
first time since the battle Piithik actually felt he had a good
chance of seeing Kharak again. The plan centered around the
station's one-shot hyperspace module. This system was meant for
smaller ships that did not have the three industrial fusion
plants necessary to provide power for the wavefront. The module
carried its own fuel but could be used only once. After the jump
into hyperspace all the fuel was expended. Since there was no
known method at the time to get new fuel, the designers left much
of the shielding off the module, which caused its circuitry to
burn up on completion of the jump. Thus the hyperspace module was
considered useless afterwards and was forgotten about.
Most of the remote mining stations had been
brought out to the asteroid rim using these; the station
included. Piithik had been quick to point this out. However
Captain Tuufol knew the method for refining the fuel used by the
hyperspace module and he assured Piithik that his propulsion
engineer could repair the module's circuitry given a little time.
While the station's lone resource collector mined the asteroids
for the materials needed in creating the module's fuel, the
hyperspace module's circuitry would be repaired. Captain Indec
figured it would take two days to do this if everyone worked
around the clock. Once the resource collector had gathered enough
ru's, the group would begin to move cautiously toward the outer
part of the asteroid rim. They would use the larger asteroids for
cover until they reached empty space on the far side of the rim.
While they were moving, the fuel for the module would be created
from the ru's and refined. It would hopefully be ready by the
time they reached open space. At this point the group would
engage their hyperdrives and leave the area. The Taiidan might
detect them jumping out, but they would not know where they were
going.
The group could only go about two light years,
as the one-shot hyperspace system did not have much of a range,
but Piithik figured it would be far enough. The nearest star
system was only 1.7 light years away and there were sure to be
some resources there for them to gather. They would then wait
until the Taiidan had left, all the while making more fuel. And
when they felt it was safe the group would jump back toward
Kharak. It would be that simple.
