Battleship Destroyer (62 page)

The
scan was half way up the other side away from the enemy fleet when a big hazy blip started to coalesce at the edge of the screen. By the time the screen centered on it, the blip had grown into an enemy ship headed for the enemy fleet on the other side of them and would cross behind them at considerable speed.

Jack breathed a sigh of relief when he realized it was going way to fast to intercept them but then realized that it would pass way to close to miss seeing them. "Damn it. Captain
! The enemy cannot intercept us but he cannot miss seeing us either." Thinking for a few seconds. "But we can intercept it. If we increase or thrust we can slow enough to get close enough to take him out. Possible before he is able to contact his fleet."

The Captain studied the screen for a few seconds then turned to the plot tank. "We have a few minutes
if he has not already seen us Mr. Turner. Finish our sweep and see if there are any other boogies out there."

Jack looked up at the Captain
not believing that she did not jump at the chance to attack the enemy ship before he could see and report them. Then remembered the last time he had jumped to a conclusion and wanted to attack. He started the sweep again covering the forward half of space and the course the fleet was headed. Picking up no traffic across their bow he stopped the sweep on the enemy fleet for a few seconds then switch the main fleet to a side screen to put the approaching enemy ship back on the main screen. Jack studied the new ship but stopped after a few seconds.

"Shit; I don't believe it
." Jack switched the screens, putting the main screen back on the fleet. “Damn. Captain, the fleet is turning to accelerate in our direction. Or should I say in an intercept course sir." Shaking his head... "The enemy ship has already seen us. But how?" We should have been way out side of his sensor range still."

The Science Officer suddenly bellowed. 
“Oh that was what that was sir. The Officer I relieved had this strange sensor readings he could not explain when I took over the watch. It is the ship crossing behind us transmitting in that ghost frequency the Ensign found during the other attack sir. He just thought it was just a part of our sensor Array sir." The Officer swallowed. "They have been transmitting off and on for an hour sir."

Bringing
the speeding enemy ship up on the main screen Jack took a closer look at it and the blobs he was trying to focus the long ranged sensors at on the fleet. At this range the blobs popped up immediately. "Captain this ship has tall towers with massive sensors replacing most of their big weapons. Probably with 3 or 4 times the range. No, this ship has had us in sensor range for a good half hour now." Jack shook his head. "But then with the narrow beam even if I had not pulled the sensors off of general forward sweep to focus on the fleet we would not have seen him in time to avoid him. It is my fault Captain. I should have went to a wide beam to check the area around us as soon as it had the band width to do it yesterday. We could have spotted him then sir."

The Captain looked down at Jack and frowned. "Boy!
Do you really think you could pull the fleet’s entire sensor network to focus on one target if I had not let you? It was my responsibility to make sure the fleet stayed covered. I failed to order the sensors to do sweeps farther than 45 degrees off the targets days ago when I should have." Shaking her head. "Don't flatter yourself Mr. Turner. Your head is not that big. That is my responsibility Turner and not yours. I am the one that screwed up." Turning to the Tactical board. "How long before they intercept us?"

"Ah
, working on that now Captain, the enemy fleet is starting from a dead stop and it looks like a good 4 days if we maintain this deceleration Gee's and just before we enter the cloud if the enemy stays at 300 Gee's sir." Looking up at the enemy fleet as it was forming up on an intercept course. "That is if we survive the battle. But we are far enough away to turn away and out run them with these new engines without increasing our Gee's over what we are doing now and they would never catch us sir. But we would not be able to stop at the cloud, let alone The Rock."

"No. Lieutenant. We are not going to run past our old engine's reaction mas
s range and tip our new abilities to the enemy."

Jack looked up at the Captain as he got up from the Command chair. "You have the Conn Captain."

The Captain turned on Jack. "Did I ask for the Conn Mr. Turner? I have better things to do. Sit your butt back down and give me a hard look at that enemy ship as it passes us. I want to know where the crew dumps its shit overboard and anything else you can tell me about the enemy. Even the size of a personnel hatch would be nice. We have never gotten this close a look at them with decent sensors thanks to the Director screwing up our sensors when we took on the other enemy ship and the sensor torpedo images of the enemy fleet ships at the frontier was not a fraction as good as what you should be able to get from the fleets sensors at this range. Take advantage of it. I want to know if they really are all the same ships only with different attachments and decks. Fact is I am going to tell the Thyme to reposition the fleet to track it as it passes. Be ready Mr. Turner. Don't blow it." Turning to the screen with the enemy fleet on it. "It is going to be interesting to see if that big mother battleship can keep up with the fleet or if it is limited to less than 300 Gee's even though it has some 8 engines. Oh see if you can find me an open bridge or a view port with the Captain starring out at us while you are at it. Carry on."

"Captain leaving the bridge." Echoed
across the bridge a few seconds later.

--------------

Jack walked into the briefing compartment with the Ensign and a dozen crewmen from the teams working on the various projects he was helping with. Stopping in mid stride, Jack stared at Director Johnson sitting next to the Captain. "I thought the Director was sitting in the brig for murder and mutiny?" The others continued in to sit around the table placing their tablet sheets and drinks down.

"No. The Director has agreed to take over the administration and coordination
of the research for you Mr. Turner. You have too many projects on your plate to do them all."

"No!" Jack dropped his
tablet on the table. "That son of a bitch can just rot in a cell. He is not going to get another chance to ruin anymore careers or kill people with his stupidity. Especially the civilian scientist that refused to follow him off the ship. He already threatened their families."

"No Mr. Turner. He does not have that authority anymore. He is only
administrative coordinator and cannot do any research which our tests have demonstrated he could not do anyway no matter what he says. What he is good at is explaining what scientists tell him so the average person can understand and figuring out how to make money and useful equipment off of what he and the other scientists learns. Both skills most scientists suck at. Combined with an aptitude for lying and no moral values enabled him to do the criminal things he has done. He is not going to get that chance while he is with us Lieutenant. Now sit down. We have a lot to cover and you have The Game to get into. You have to figure out how to get us out of this trap and save our lives without tipping our hand."

"But sir all we have to do is out run them. We can do that
easily." One of the civilian scientists said.

"No we cannot Mr
. Eliot, I am not ready to give away our trump card just yet, but I don't want to sacrifice half the fleet saving it either. Not to mention that two of our ships are at their maximum acceleration now flying on one damaged engine." Noticing the man's Bafflement. "Fragments from the destroyed engine knocked out a lot of the engine coils reducing the available power from their one good engine. Being transports there was no armor between them. Something we will have to fix in the future. The amazing thing is that the engines are running at all with all the damage. Tuff little suckers as it turns out."

Jack frowned as he looked away from the Director.
"We are close to the Rock which I figure all these enemy ships are here at the cloud trying to find in the first place. Do I get to use the Rock's resources as well? A new ship has not joined the fleet in six months. They should have between 20 and 30 of the new design by now ready for combat. After all they already had the hulls half built from what I understood from putting together the bits and pieces I have heard. The new ship was just supposed to be an alteration of our current battleships to include the new mass tanks as shield decks in front and everything else moved into the back half. Nothing that hard to do even if it is revolutionary."

The Admiral smiled.
"They would have over 50 if they were not being refitted with your engines and the new larger guns that finally arrived. They are very excited with your team’s new Plasma pipe barrel liner as well as the black hole shields if they can make it work. One that does work rather well are the new torpedo Black hole warheads and those upgraded torpedo engines.  Not to mention the possibility of tapping into the enemy communications as well as all the other projects. If they can make them work. The advances have been quite remarkable so far. The Director will continue the teams on those lines. He thinks he can improve on the speed of the work by shuffling the personnel in the teams around a little. Putting the most experienced people where they belong."

"Bullshit
Captain. The teams are just fine the way they are. The best people are already where they belong and that has nothing to do with experience. But loyalty does have a lot to do with controlling people's jobs and where they work. That is the director's game. Using intimidation and threat of firing and job assignments to make people do what he wants or shut them up."

"Relax Mr. Turner. I will have veto power on everything he does and firing people is not one of his abilities.
" Looking over at the Director and frowning. "Ok Jack. You will have veto power on any reassignments as well. Now let's get to the reviews and reports so everyone can get back to their work."

"What the hell am I
supposed to do Captain!" Bellowed the Dr. Johnson the Director. "If I can't reassign personnel and fire them, I can't do anything to improve their performance or get you what you want. I need to have power over these people if you want results."

Jack stood up. "You had the power before and not only did not help us or get results you used it to terrorize your teams while
withholding information…"

"That is enough Lieutenant." The Captain turned to the Director.  "The Director will just have to use other methods like his sparking personality to motivate the teams." Smiling at the director. "And all reports from each team will come straight to my desk Director. You have no say or right to change anything they produce
, not one word. As I said you will use your sparkling personality, reputation and brains to cultivate and guide your teams to their great accomplishments and breakthroughs like all Captains of great ships do."

An hour later Jack sat stone faced as the Director stopped next to Jack on his way out
of the mostly empty compartment. "You have done a great job with the work you have accomplished so far Mr. Turner. I will do my best to continue where you left off. You have made some great advancements and put together some great teams. You should be proud of yourself and them. But you simply don't have the experience to get the most out of the work teams. I do."

"Director,
I am proud of them and I will not let you destroy them like I have recently heard you have done too many others over the years including my grandfather."

"Dear boy. Your grandfather wanted out of the lime light so he could raise a family in peace and I helped him and others with their full knowledge and cooperation. I destroyed no one. Most scientist only have one good idea in them and I just made sure that one good idea made them some money and helped humanity."

“Humanity Hell! The only one you have ever helped is yourself. The Congress may eat your shit but I have you on my phone threatening the families of the guys that tried to kill me while confessing to trying to do the same to my Grandfather then planning to finish the job. I have looked at your records since then with the Ensigns help and far too many scientist that have worked for you have disappeared or committed suicide to even be believable outside whoever you are bribing.

"You little shit. You’re the ones that should have been killed attacking a race a million years older and more advanced than us. I was trying to save them and the rest of the human race.
The Spiders have to be advanced and know they can achieve more from peaceful trade than war."

The Captain stopped at the hatch. "Ok
Gentlemen that is enough. You both have work to do now get at it. Mr. Turner, I expect to see you on The Game within the hour. The auxiliary bridge has the best connection and equipment. It is all yours." Turning to the Director.  "Just remember. If you try to contact or transmit or leave this ship you die and if you lie or try to sabotage a program or create a mutiny I will kill you myself. That includes one threatening word of any kind."

The Director pulled down his shirt collar showing a thin metal ring around his neck. "Yes Captain I understand fully
. It will record my every word and move. Any tampering trying to get it off and it will kill me. I am your slave."

"J
ust don't forget that Director." The Captain left.