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Strategos (A Great Captain Roberts Tale!!)
Chapter 29 - To Blaze[]
"Light missile system is…
…toast, we've got multiple fragment penetrations between Frame 1104 and 1115, but the ammo containment held."
Amanda nodded. "Okay, casualties?"
"Five, and no, they won't need sick-bay."
She spat an obscene epithet. "Make sure we're rerouted on anything we needed that passes through that section," she scowled at Mister Seron. "Five of ours. Not terrible,but not optimum. Mister Bedwyr, how far out are Illusive's fighters?"
"Three minutes, Relay shows the enemy's in motion."
Three minutes is an eternity.
"All guns adjust fire to cover our sudden lack of missiles on point defense." she ordered. "Bedwyr, we still have some small craft in the bays, yes?"
"We sent out the Aquariuses, but we've still got the Mark Eights."
"Have the deck boys ready the Mark Eights," she said. "Who do we have to fill those seats?"
Seron cleared his throat, "The marine complement includes several who graduated flight school-it might have been more than a decade ago-"
"The Protomech pilots?" she inquired.
"Aff."
"They're our backups on air defense then. Make sure those shuttles have full complements of rocket pods and drop tanks. Plus any of those fancy missiles we wanted to test out."
Seron grinned wide, somehow making him seem almost as deranged as his commander. "On it!"
"If we survive this, I have a few ideas," Samuel announced as he returned to CIC. "The utilities weren't damaged, Captain, just some through-armor damage we'll have to patch before we can pressurize that section again."
"Good. Hold on to your ideas," Amanda said. "Enemy's burning out of orbit, and they're ignoring the Beta Star strikes."
"Two minutes," Bedwyr said.
"Clear my flight decks for incoming, we'll have to rely on the Enn-Ells until they can make the return crossing, so I guess we wait on fitting the Marks."
"Bring us up to…
One point five Gees acceleration." Foster was calm and cold. The enemy was following one of the possible responses…the worst one, really, the one move that had come up as a contingency.
The Lynnwood was shifting from bombardment to interception posture, while Evanescent was tied down with flight deck ops.
Whatever, Sarah Inslee thought of her cousin. She'd clearly missed that the man was actually capable, possibly even moderately competent.
"How long until we're in engagement range with the Subcapital Cannons and Piranhas?" he asked.
"Should be fifteen minutes at this acceleration relative to theirs, Sir."
"Keep me apprised, and start plotting a firing solution for when we reach the common range band. In the meantime, Bravo Star and Alpha's NL's are to continue striking at the enemy's sensor positions and ranging equipment. We cannot do anything about the manual analog systems, but we CAN do something about his active sensors, and I do not want that hulk able to radiate."
"What are our targets, Sir?"
"Johnny, WE are going after his engine package," Foster announced. "We are going to blind them, then cripple them, then, I guess we will, after all, be boarding them to finish them off…assuming they do not finish US off first."
"Twenty Minutes…
…until we're matching their frame of reference, Lord Captain!"
Bart grunted under the weight of hard burn acceleration. "Good."
Damage alerts began lighting again. "Point defense! Keep firing!!"
Another status went red, the shuttles trying to provide defensive fire against the enemy's air wings weren't up to the task-the Mark VIIs just didn't have the maneuverability.
But soon, he'd be in range to engage their carrier, and then, it's just mopping up.
"We've lost ranging radar and LIDAR!
"
"Do we still have collimators and scopes?" he demanded.
"Aye!!"
"Then gunnery crews are to engage manually when we reach range!!" he barked.
Ahead of them, the darkness of space lit with a silvery fusion torch, and his stomach dropped. They're moving!!
"We've got energy on them, they can't escape…" he muttered.
"Last fighter clear!!"
"Helm, all ahead two gravities!" Amanda barked. "NOW!!"
The heavy pull shoved her down in her seat, as Evanescent's main engines lit for the first time in the last two hours.
"It's a stern chase," she said. "Are they in their range?"
"Not yet, Ma'am."
"Good. We're going to crab with the RCS thrusters while we're moving, position on the Illusive?"
"Closing on the enemy at oblique minus zed axis fifteen degrees."
She looked at the status. "Burn for five minutes, then pause burn, get marines to the marks."
"Excuse me?"
"We can board," she said, "See? He's down to optical gunnery and no escorts. We're going to take his xxxxx destroyer from him. Launch our teams as soon as we stop burning then bring us port positive axis ten by fifteen, then burn again at one point five."
"Aye, Ma'am."
"Mister Seron, you have a boarding to carry out. Miss Franklyn, you're on gunnery duty!"
"What do you want, Ma'am?"
"When they reach gunnery range, I want you to practice shooting at his weapons stations along starboard forward arcs, while we play acceleration and frame of reference games! Use our nifty advanced equipment and triangulate based on the networked sensors from the AeroSpace Fighters and small craft!"
He's blinded, or impaired at least, we can out-shoot him now.
"We have range…
...Captain!"
David Foster was decisive, "Fire, target main engines and aft weapons!"
The hull of illusive vibrated slightly as the subcapital cannons, piranha missiles, and naval lasers fired in salvo at the SLS Lynnwood's aft quarter.
It was as good an announcement of 'here I am' as you can imagine it to be.
The enemy's thrust cone of fusing helium plasma shifted spectra toward the red, and their acceleration profile dropped from three gees, to one gee, just that quick.
"Again."
The Lynnwood's RCS were firing, no longer trying to track on Evanescent, only for a faint brightness to cross their starboard forend, blooming with ablating plates of heavy armor.
Meanwhile the fighter wings that were out, converged to suppress secondary and tertiary sensor emplacements, exposed weapons, anything that might cripple the destroyer's ability to return fire accurately.
The engine nacelles began flickering, going from pinkish to orange, to red…to darkness.
"Evanescent is launching boarders."
"Alright then, back them up." David's tone was satisfied. He even smiled. "I have a few ideas on what to do about the next upgrade package," he commented.
"To ours?"
"No, to the Evanescent." he asserted.