The Front
Lunar Space
“All stations this net, this is Midway. Hold fire, I say again, hold fire.”
Cameron looked down at his hands, surprised to find them shaking. He turned to his wingman but for once George was silent, staring open-mouthed at the spectacle. Cameron looked back at the surreal beauty of the battle. Silver craft exploded in a dazzling rainbow of colors, and black Y-shaped fighters spiraled and erupted, leaving glowing red nebulas in their wake.
“Can you track them? I can’t get an acquisition lock.” The voice came from another pilot in the SP line. Cameron realized he couldn’t get a lock on signal from his passive radar. The system was designed to pick up on space debris, but seemed dumfounded by the new ships.
“What do you think, George?”
The pilot pulled his attention reluctantly from the battle. “Laser lock should work. We could try getting closer, but I’d rather not.”
“Afraid of a little action?” Cameron teased.
“Nah,” George said. “Just feeling particularly lazy at the moment. Let someone else draw suicide detail.”
Cameron felt around his belt and located his good-luck charm. Regulations prohibited jewelry, but the small silver cross had more than religious value for the pilot and he loathed to be without it. Still, rather than risk strangulation, he had found a better place to stow it than around his neck.
“Wolf One, Valley Forge.”
Cameron took a quick sip from the line before answering. “This is Wolf One, go ahead.”
The operator on the other end of the line spoke softly, almost anxiously. “FRAGO to follow. Standby for Valley Forge actual.” Cameron’s pulse quickened. Seconds passed while the radio transferred to DeHart. Fragmentation orders were usually passed out by communication officers, not commanders.
“Wolfpack, Valley Forge actual. You are ordered to close with unknown vessels in quadrant forty-one-thirty-two and scan using active radar. Once a proper signal is acquired, you are to check for radio, laser, and beam traffic in order to identify what net these ships are using for communication. You are to hold fire unless fired upon. Do you understand?”
Cameron couldn’t answer for a moment. “Sir, you want us to paint unknown targets?”
“That is correct. Ensure all safeties are engaged before moving out.”
“Captain,” Cameron stammered. “Couldn’t that trigger them to attack?”
DeHart mumbled something away from the mic. Cameron could swear he heard the phrase “dumb shit Sector flyboys.” “They haven’t so much as sniffed in our direction yet. No reason to suspect they will now.”
“Unless we start bouncing target signals off their hulls. Sir.”
Valley Forge continued: “Your orders are clear. Brief your pilots and move. Valley Forge out.”
Cameron stared out his cockpit at the distant cruiser, absolutely dumbfounded. That Fleet could so casually dispatch SP into a violent collision of unknown warships infuriated him. A Sparrow, piloted by a Fleet scout team, could get in and out without risking fire from the enemy. The Phoenix packed a punch, but the older second-series models were far less maneuverable than the new fighters. And given the acrobatics the unknown vessels seemed capable of, Cameron had every right to feel uneasy.
“Wolf Squadron, this is Wolf One.” Cameron cleared his throat, unhappy with the orders he was about to give. “We’re going to move in on the unidentified ships in quadrant forty-one. ROE hasn’t changed, but we’re going to paint them with active radar to determine if we’re able to achieve target lock. Once you have acquisition, maintain line of sight and try to get some data for the ghosts in the Fade. We’re dividing into Flights, so break into your fighting pairs. Wolf Nine, you’re the odd man out, so you’re with George and me.”
George snickered. “Who the heck is Wolf Nine?”
“Cut it out, Locklear.” Ensign McLane pulled his fighter up alongside George’s. “It’s a dumb joke, and I’m getting really sick of it. I’m gonna tattoo my ID number on your chest when we’re done here.”
“I’ll hold him down for you,” Cameron said.
“Devil’s threesome?” George chuckled. “I’m in, but my safe word is ‘doily.’”
TSC Valley Forge
Lunar Space
Aboard the supercruiser Valley Forge, Commander Sam DeHart paced the bridge. The size of a bedroom, the operation center of the half mile-long ship sat dead center and twenty feet below the top hull. When the first battle cruiser sailed from the International Orbital Ship Yard back in 2101, the bridge sat atop the vessel and gave the officers on the deck a magnificent view of the stars and any action that occurred on their plane of the battlefield. That design choice lasted until the first pebble smashed through the diamond windows, killing the command-and-control structure for the entire ship.
Subsequent models placed the bridge in a safe position, and numerous cameras fed live images to a wall of monitors all around the room. It made for a more impressive view—and a more dynamic one. At any moment, a direction could be called up and viewed with incredible detail, allowing for full 360-degree situational awareness. And, most important, the chain of command would be maintained unless an attack achieved a catastrophic kill.
Captain Fuller, the executive officer, stood near the battlefield projector marking positions on his personal tablet. Though DeHart had a mind for ship-on-ship warfare, Fuller’s specialty remained the big picture. It wouldn’t be long before he commanded a ship of his own—in fact he could have had any vessel of Destroyer class or under already. Yet the allure and prestige of the Cruiser, the last true warship the Fleet possessed, called to him. DeHart would, in short order, be promoted to commodore, and he could either take a carrier or a desk. Not that he felt there was much of a difference.
“It’s a dogfight so far,” Fuller said. He watched the graphical display more than the monitors around him. The computer used images from the various cameras to create a three-dimensional model of the battlefield. But without proper tracking signatures, the smaller craft jumped around erratically whenever they moved beyond the cameras’ line of sight. Fuller had placed a whiteboard next to the display and was taking notes on each ship type by hand. “These two frigates,” he pointed to two floating spheres, “seem to be air-denial. They’re building a wall of shrapnel around that carrier.”
DeHart, from his chair above the main tier of the bridge, watched the action on the monitors. “Both sides have cruisers. Why aren’t they engaging?” No one answered. DeHart often posed his thoughts aloud as a part of his mental process. It took some getting used to. A lot of new crewmen would try to answer his questions, but one withering stare from the commander was enough to teach them when to respond and when to stay quiet. “It could be our presence is putting them in a defensive posture. They don’t know which side we’ll come in on.”
“And if a round from a cruiser misses its target and hits us, or one of the civilian stations…” Fuller let the thought die in the air. “It’s not a bad theory, Commander. It could be this is a new form of martial etiquette.”
The CO stared blankly at his second-in-command. “Are you saying this is a British line formation brought into space?”
Fuller shrugged. “If I’m the only person thinking it, then lock me up. We don’t have ships that use weapons anywhere near this design. I’m not familiar with all of the Cove’s dirty little secrets, but I think I’d remember catching a glimpse of one of these being built at Colorum.” He pointed to the two unknown battle groups. “These aren’t humans, Sam. They don’t have to think like we do, nor do they have to behave like we’d want them to.”
DeHart bit his thumb. He didn’t