A Deep Sleep (Valhalla Book 1) (16 page)

Danford rose with the rest of the passengers on the shuttle and proceeded to follow the herd out of the shuttle, down the tube, and into the disembark station. From there he headed straight for the elevators to try and catch the first one he could down to the surface. While the Earth to space elevator concept was still a forlorn research project with poor economic prospects, the Luna space elevators worked just fine with the low natural gravity and lack of atmosphere. Forty minutes later, he stepped out of the car and strode across to a face he immediately recognized.

“Captain Hanford, good to see you.” Danford said warmly, exchanging first salutes and then handshakes.

“And you as well sir.” Hanford smiled at his commanding officer.

“How’s the battalion?” Danford asked.

“They are fully equipped sir.” Hanford said flatly. “Past that, our veterans are good to go and the ones returning from medical leave are returning to form nicely. As for the greenies,” He made a sour face. “they are somewhat rougher material to work with.”

“I have no doubt.” Danford laughed aloud. “I trust that the good Gunnery Sergeant is working on sanding off the rough edges?”

“Yes sir, you could say that.” Hanford grinned. “MSgt Gilson has been going to town with a power-sander more than sandpaper, though sir. She has made great progress, but we’ve had a few accidents.” Danford accepted a tablet from Hanford.

“One fatality and three injuries that preclude immediate combat assignments.” Danford sighed, hard. “Unfortunately, I suspect we’re going to see that number increase somewhat. I’ve done some reading between-the-lines intelligence, mostly on the way up. I’ll explain what I suspect when we’re more, privately located.”

Hanford nodded uncertainly and led Danford across the disembarking zone to a waiting ground car. Hanford closed up the vehicle and the car whisked them away towards the Marine Corp Dome.

Sol system

1
st
Deep Strike Fleet (DSF-1): USS
Tripoli

“Admiral, the last task force has transited the system via the Foxtrot slip gate.” Johnson reported.

“Very well. Commander Daniels, signal the Fleet, execute pre-entrance maneuver preparation and hold for my signal.” Athena ordered. Admiral Mondragon was leading almost half of the total Allied tonnage left in any state of combat readiness into the Chinese controlled GJ 48, a major defensive line for the Chinese. This was their chokepoint, with only lighter system defenses and mobile patrols beyond. As such, the Chinese had to defend it. With the amount of tonnage coming their way, they would be forced to come against Mondragon with most of what was left of their own fleet. Brazilian Admiral Temer was leading the other half of the combined tonnage against the Russians in a near identical maneuver. This would be the battle that decided the fortunes moving forward. Humanity was about to commit nearly all of their combatants to two battles. If either side emerged a clear victor, they would have unchallenged command of space for several years while industry was rebuilt. It would likely decide the war, finishing what the Battle of Sol started. This was operation Deep Dive, Admiral Mondragon’s strategic gamble.

But Admiral Mondragon had an ace up his sleeve, DSF-1. Once the two forces were heavily engaged, DSF-1 would burst into the system at a high-C fraction, FTL across to the Beta gate, and leave the system. Their destination was Eta Cassiopeia and Mu Cassiopeia. The two systems represented almost all of Chinese industry outside of Sol, which meant it was now the majority of their industry. So long as Mondragon drew the majority of the Chinese forces out, DSF-1 would be able to engage and destroy the system defenses and wipe away any straggling defenders, all before the Chinese could realize what was happening, disengage, and pursue. Or so went the plan.

For now, however, they had to wait until Mondragon did just that. Athena planned to have her force on track for the Foxtrot slip gate at 0.30C, waiting for Mondragon’s command to FTL to the gate, jump through, and begin the cross-system trek. The Beta slip gate was a half hour trip at 50x light. Once through that gate, DSF-1 would have to transit VYS-2 and through its Beta gate to reach Eta Cassiopeia. Any straggling ships that Mondragon hadn’t successfully drawn out would be her problem then.

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Three decks below CIC, Captain Kim had gathered her four lieutenants together for a final pre-deployment briefing. Admiral Harper had given her permission to shuttle over the two who were on
Tripoli
’s sisters. She had also recommended, but stressed that she was not ordering, that Kim invite the Agema commander to the meeting. Kim had rolled that one around a bit before deciding to include the Aegis operator, Lieutenant Amelia Scott. Scott had 48 Agema split into 16-man elements, spread across three of the Aegis warships. Agema typically operated in four-man teams, but they practiced operations up to 24, at least according to the briefing materials that Kim had seen a number of times. Aegis was very secretive about its black ops people.

The Agema program itself was quite controversial, with each member typically serving for life. The process of training and modification came at a steep price, 50% of trainees washed out and of those that made it through the process, 25% died at some point during the modifications. Kim understood the drive behind the modifications, but she knew that many people shuddered at the thought and shunned them as a result. Agema had many surgical modifications done to their bodies to make them more effective. Their eyes were replaced with artificial ones; improving vision, adding thermal and low light vision, allowing for limited tactical projections directly into their field of view, and reducing the effects of certain damaging effects that could be incurred with natural eyes. They also had strength enhancements done via gene therapy, though science limited the effect of these to a small percentage increase in strength. Adrenaline production capacities were increased, as well as the body’s ability to handle long duration exposure to the same. Bone strength and density were increased, reducing breakages and improving the soldier’s ability to handle heavy loads.

The most repulsive for many, was the surgical implantation of neural interfaces. Agema utilized these interfaces for a variety of purposes. They could interface themselves with properly configured computers, using a computer interface they could also hack directly into computers. Agema could also interface directly with their armored fighting suits, human wetware to armored hardware. The suits fed data through these interfaces, allowing them to have a sensation like touch when armored. Agema could perceive damage to their suits even before a computer could process the information. They didn’t feel pain, per sea, but instead a slight feeling of discomfort to alert them to the health of their suit. Finally, they could aim, fire, and control other basic suit functions with a thought. Any others could be controlled manually. Kim knew that RASAT operator often boasted that they wore their armor like a second skin, but with the Agema, Kim wondered what it would be like to truly wear it like a second skin. The level of integration went beyond comfort to downright assimilation. Even still, Kim knew it came at an often terrible cost.

Kim pushed the thoughts aside as the fourth lieutenant arrived. They were only waiting on Lt. Scott now. One minute before the prescribed time, Lt. Scott entered the compartment. She executed a quick but proper salute before taking one of the last two seats at the table. Kim saw the glances between her lieutenants and decided to get right down to business.

“Thank you all for coming. This may seem like an unorthodox assignment for a RASAT unit, but I assure you Rear Admiral Harper requested our presence because she suspects she may need us, or have use for us. That’s right, she requested us.” Kim saw two of the lieutenants look at one another quizzically at that. “I’m not sure how aware any of you are of this, but Admiral Harper is considered something of an unorthodox tactician, a good one by any measure. She’s pulled off an impressive list of assignments, including a few she probably shouldn’t have made it through, but did. If she thinks she might need us, then we should probably be ready.” Kim gestured to Lieutenant Scott.

“We also have support from Aegis Command, a unit of Agema under the command of Lieutenant Amelia Scott. Lieutenant Scott is based aboard the
Thunderer
and her unit is spread between three of the Aegis ships in this Fleet. We will be working closely with them, so I expect us all to get along.” Kim looked hard at each lieutenant in turn. “Understood?”

“Yes, sir.” The RASAT lieutenants answered in unison.

“Understood, sir.” Scott answered a half-second behind. Kim thought that might have been intentional, purposefully not trying to outshout the RASATs. If so, it was probably a clever move. Verbal shouting matches never earned any respect, especially from a RASAT. Only combat could do that.

“Good. Now, I want to discuss some training exercises that I’d like us each to run to get a better feel for operating aboard ship and used to the ships we are each on.”

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“Admiral, sir. Contact emerging from the Foxtrot slip gate, it’s a gunboat sir.” Heath’s voice roused Athena from her light sleep. DSF-1 had been speeding towards the slip gate for nearly 2 days now with no word. It looked like now, they were about to have that word.

“On my way.” Athena was in CIC in under twenty seconds. “Report!” She snapped out upon entry.

“One Eagle gunboat emerged from the gate approximately five minutes ago and immediately went to FTL. Speed is holding at 25x light. They’ll be approaching FTL comm range in about 30 seconds now sir.” Heath got the reply out before Athena made it to the command island. Athena completed the OOD handover procedure and sat in the command chair.

“Sound general quarters.” Athena ordered. If this was the go signal, they needed to be ready.

“Ensign Johnson, any idea why that gunboat is only going 25?” Athena inquired.

“Well sir, we’re getting strange energy readings off her sir. It’s definitely an Eagle, but it’s…” She trailed off. Heath was looking at the same read-outs, clearly having found it strange himself.

“She’s running with a bad fusion reactor sir, I’d say she’s probably got multiple hull breaches as well. Energy leakage is higher without proper shielding provided by the outer hull.” Heath said quietly.

“I concur sir, but with this level of leakage…she’ll be lucky to make it to us.” Johnson’s tone was subdued. CIC was silent as a crypt as everyone willed the gunboat to make it, for the fusion containment to hold out. Athena could feel the tension radiating from each and every body in the compartment. Finally Johnson spoke up again, killing the deathly silence. “Emergence in three, two, one.”

On cue the Eagle dropped to normal space. As she did, five short missiles sprinted from her hull, followed by three of the four lifeboats the gunboat had. The fourth waited two seconds before starting its own thrust away from her dying mothership. She barely cleared the launch rails. The struggling gunboat’s fusion core escaped containment and the Eagle, along with the last lifeboat, was engulfed in a brilliant display of energy. CIC was quiet for a moment before Athena broke the silence.

“SAR teams, scramble for immediate recovery. Three lifeboats. Receive further information from Commander Sanders.” Athena said as she slapped her palm down on the emergency comm button placed for just that purpose.

“SAR launching now, Admiral.” Came the quick reply. SAR always went to stand-by when the ship was at GQ.

“Status on those missiles?”

“They’ve gone to coast, broadcasting a continuous homing beacon. They’re data recorders sir, black boxes.” Johnson responded.

“Get drones out to retrieve them, all of them.” Athena said.
We need to know what happened.

It took twenty minutes to accelerate the drones out to capture the now drifting black boxes. They had been programmed to jettison clear of the gunboat, but someone had modified their programming so that they remained near their launch point, actually using most of their thrust to come to a relative stop alongside DSF-1. The captain of that Eagle had known running at 25x light was his ship’s last mission.

“Deck Chief Warn reports that they are hooking the drones in now to recover the logs.” Daniels reported. Athena simply nodded and waited.

“Receiving data now sir. Flag priority message coming across, make that two sir. One from the Eagle, one from Admiral Mondragon.” Daniels reported several minutes later.

“Admiral Mondragon’s first, video on-screen.” Athena ordered.

“Yes sir, decoding just finishing now.” Daniels queued the video message and put it on screen. Everyone in CIC saw Mondragon’s face come on-screen, his helmet on but visor up. A fire raged in several consoles behind his command island and DC teams were working feverishly to put out the flames. The automatic firefighting system seemed to be out on the flag bridge. At least two crew were slumped motionless over their consoles, but the shot was too tight to get an idea of whether they were simply unconscious or dead. Athena couldn’t help but think that this was becoming familiar when receiving communications. The thought made her feel sick and she quickly pushed it aside. When Mondragon began to speak, his voice was hoarse from smoke inhalation.

“Admiral Harper, Operation Keypunch is a go. We’ve engaged the Chinese fleet, and then some. We’re reading more than 500 combatants in system.” Heath let out a small quiet gasp. Intel had estimated that the Chinese had no more than 350 effectives remaining.