Left Behind (Ghosts Of War Book 4) (4 page)

With the last detachable module left floating in space, the European warship assumed the last configuration. Shaped as an arrow, its black surface ridden with medium-range sensors and railgun towers, the “Roma” could do nothing more than unleash its full destructive potential.

At the opposite side, the giant Chinese admiral ship was getting ready for war. Side sections of the hull, each longer than the enemy ship, slided back to uncover auxiliary battle stations. The command section, the core of the hive mind, closed all the internal doors and activated every watt of power from the emergency batteries. “Chang'e” was ready and deadlier than ever.

Compared for size and for the complex of their battle resources there was no real match between the two ships. Their routes were set for a frontal approach and that was the key for the European strategy. “Chang'e” was developed as a long cylinder, with more than eighty percent of its firepower available when the enemy was at a side. At the prow there were a huge number of railguns, not enough to match a formidable warship like the “Roma”.  There were not only two spaceships but two different concepts of war in space.

The two ships of the “Roma” class were built with two purposes only; to carry as much artillery as possible and to present the slightest section to the enemy in battle. All its railguns could be used face-front, projecting from fifty to two hundred Mach 20 tungsten-carbonite slugs every two seconds. With such a power to field even the thirty-eight pieces at the prow of the Chinese ship weren't a match. So both ships started to set up little changes in their routes, the Chinese to expose as much as they could of one of their sides, the Europeans to keep the head-on approach while avoiding as many shots as possible.

To cover their actions, to drive away enemy's attention and to build themselves a screen of false targets they both open fire. It was open season, the end of the first space-based conflict of human history. For the Russian crew who got to have first row seats, it was even worst, what they saw was the uncanny rage of two ghosts hordes, riding the deadliest weapon system ever developed. Aside from any philosophy of historical consideration, it was about hate.

Chinese drew blood first. A two-inch shot, traveling at the combined speed of Mach 35, blew away a chuck of the front shield of the “Roma”. Ten seconds after the first wave of slugs from the European warship partly hit home on the upper section of the prow, obliterating two railguns and igniting a secondary explosion in the underway deck. Both ships trembled under the combined vibrations caused by their own artillery and the hits received.

From mid ship the “Chang'e” fired four hi-speed missiles that detached from the main body before igniting all their propulsion units. One of them was hit by a slug, another one suffered a guidance problem and got itself lost. The last two approached the “Roma” at Mach 40, both from the port side.

Commander Scatena got the situation well in hand. With no more missiles to use for intercept what the Chinese could throw at his ship, he knew for sure that there were only two choices. The first was to use a specific kind of nuclear weapon in order to generate an EMP and burn the electric components of the missiles. But it wasn't a viable choice, the “Roma” will get damaged as well. So, he played a last resort card and launched twenty decoy buoys at once, running out of his last defense in a single move.

It worked. Both explosions happened near the European ship, rocking its structure for a few seconds. Not enough to stop it.

***  

Using railguns was tricky at best. Even the best models suffered from structure failures after a certain number of shots and if a critical damage occurred at the wrong time the secondary explosion could be awesome. So, in a normal battle a wise captain would never fire all his pieces at once in order to save his fight capacity for the longest time possible. Sensitive artificial intelligence, like the Chinese Collective, did the same.

For a ghost it was different.

Commander Scatena knew for sure that his ship was in the best conditions possible and none of his ghost crew had anything to spare for the future. So there was no quarter and no thoughts about failure. They keep firing at max frequency.

***

Inside the control center, the entity known as Collective was considering the ongoing battle, trying to extrapolate the best course of action to gain another victory. It was the thirty-eight time that the “Chang'e” was involved in a battle and the mighty cyber vessel always had the upper hand in a matter of minutes. In the past there was always the knowledge that human opponents will do anything to save their ships or to protect the lives of the crews. This new ship simply did not swerve from its intended path.

***

More devastating blows hit the “Rome”. Each hyper-accelerated slug on target break havoc in some part the ship, on the main screen a number of alerts showed up, glowing red signals that spoke about danger and failing systems. The only reaction of the crew was disconnecting the alarms, one by one, until only the image of the enemy ship remained at the center of the screen.

***

The “Chang'e” was trembling. Half of the prow was a mess of dark holes, three out of five of the main carbonite steel beam had been damaged until the point of collapse and a lucky shot penetrated the innards of the ship before annihilating a secondary power unit. The space giant was losing away parts of the external hull and a third of its maneuvering engines was offline. More and more Chinese ghosts were smashed by the raw power of the three of five inch shots fired by the “Roma”, their last output recorded by their collective conscience. For the first time, the concept of fear showed up in the biggest mind ever created.

«Mikhail, I made it! Now we have direct comms with the habitat, I'm opening the channel right now.»

«Well done, son. Let's hear our new friends.»

There was a lot of static and more noise than near Jupiter, but there was a real voice from the habitat. A frightened man's voice, frail with age and pain.

«“Zel’dovich”, do you copy? Are you still listening?»

«Right here, man! I'm captain Babuskhin and I have at my side my aide, Dmitry Anuchin. We're almost at your door, synchronizing orbits in a matter of ten minutes or so.»

«Oh, my God. I can't, I just can't tell you how much is important for us to finally hear the voice of another man. I mean, I already know that you are out there but this is overwhelming.»

More noises, other voices in the background.

«Uh, captain? I'm Russel. Ol'man Jacob here is, well, he's out for a moment. He's crying.»

«It's OK, don't you worry about that. I can understand.»

The Hell you can, that was the message in the eyes of Dmitry. Mikhail acknowledged with a grimace. A generation of psychologist could not understand as well the feelings of such a community, stranded and oppressed for decades.

After a while Jacob came back on line, his old voice now under control.

«Captain Babuskhin, please tell me about what's going on. From what we have just experienced the habitats around Pluto should have been destroyed.»

«That's right. Both of them. The European ship canceled them with two nuclear warheads, they're nothing but dust by now.»

«May their souls be damned forever. If they ever had a soul, of course. What's going on with the ship?»

«You mean, the “Chang'e”?»

«We... we don't pronounce its name.»

«Well, it's your choice. For what I can see from our sensors they're taking a serious beating. We detect a lot of high-energy impacts and their missiles failed to knock out the Euros.»

Silence. More and more indistinguishable voices in the background.

«Jacob? Are you still here?»

«I am. My people here are a bit astonished, you see, a lot of them never knew of what's out this tin can. They grew here, do you understand?»

«Guess so. Well, they've to discover a lot. Don't you worry, once the media will get the news you will be the in the eye of the storm. Your governments will help you in every way.»

«Are you sure?»

«Jacob, c'mon. You're prisoner of war, people who have been missed for years.»

«What about the ones who have been changed?»

Mikhail stopped for a while. The words of commander Scatena loud and clear in his mind.

«Man, I don't know what will happen to all your mates. What I know is that your captivity is over and that if there's a cure to help who has been changed it will be used. It's over, Jacob.»

«That will be true only if the European ship win. If not, you will be killed and we will suffer like never before.»

Fear. For a few seconds the hive mind savored the new feeling, storing self-diagnostics for future evaluations and upgrades. The damage level of prow section was over everything experienced before and the loss of navigation capability was even worse. The strategic range of options were limited to zero, the only possible solution to win was to suppress the enemy fire with a superior power. With no more missile to fire the “Chang'e” set up all the maneuver engines on the port side and cut the power of the opposite side of the main engines. Time to fire all the starboard guns.

***

The change of course of the Chinese ship was expected by Commander Scatena. His battle plan was strictly related to this moment.

«All hands, stop fire! Revert power to all engines and kick off the emergency batteries. It's our moment, folks! We are going to rip off their heads!»

Without the weapons recoil, free form the damage of the incoming fire and forced to the last joule of energy to speed onward the “Roma” gained distance in a matter of seconds, the enemy ship bigger and bigger on the main screen.

***

The structure of the “Chang'e” was crying havoc. The sudden inertial load on the main axis, forced by the change of course, and the damage received from the European warship were more than enough to cripple more than fifty meters of the over structure of the prow that gave away, exposing the inner structures to space. More and more sub systems failed, badly compensated by batteries and secondary power units. Even in this mayhem, the central system acknowledged the tactic change in the “Roma” attack. For the first since its initialization it failed to come up with an answer. There was nothing more to do. Only to fight until the end.

***

Second after second, the crew of “Roma” saw the final moments of their everlasting hunt approach on the main screen. The starboard artillery of the Chinese ship were already shooting a few shots, wide by hundreds of kilometers. What was important for them was to see the prow slowly dismantle, its debris turning and crashing against the hull of enemy warship. In what was left of their minds, in the dark holes of their souls, the red rage that sustained them after death was burning like the deepest pit of the Hell. Their ship was damaged too, a third of the secondary systems were offline and two of the five nuclear reactors aboard were well over the safety range, spreading deadly radiations in the stern section. Nobody cared for that.

***

Ten seconds. That was the time left before the European ship could enter in the effective range of the starboard artillery. No matter how many were being disabled by the disaster that was happening in the prow section, there were more than enough to crush once for all the enemy. Victory was near. The invincible “Chang'e” was ready to claim its last prize.       

«All hands, ready to fire. Disconnect every other system but engines, low range sensors and weapons.»

The dead crew of the European ship was busy again, bony fingers pushing switches and keying instructions. One after another, all firing stations came back to life. The bright light of the main deck changed to the red color of emergency.

The ten seconds interval expected by the Chinese wasn't still expired when the “Roma” resumed its wall of fire.  Now operating without any constraints the railguns released every watt of power they could to propel slug after slug to the side of the enemy ship. At that range, there was no chance to miss a single shot.

***

The Chinese collective was experiencing something new about its latest discover. There were more levels in fear, sensations that could finally explain words recorded from its victims. Anguish. Horror. Terror. A wave of emotions almost silenced the cyber mind, as soon as the rain of hyper accelerated slugs crippled more and more sections of the starboard side. With entire subsets of its expanded conscience ripped away, with the loss of existence of so many members of its crew, the concept of death finally emerged from the deepest parts of its memory banks.

***

Commander Scatena rose for the last time form its chair, shaking hands with his crew. They turned their back from the main screen, where the side of the enemy ship was so big to left no space around. In the lowest part of the screen, a red proximity alert message flashed. Nobody reacted, nor even think about a last second maneuver. The crew closed up in a collective embrace, a band of brothers and sisters finally ready to cross the final door.

***

A third of the ship was destroyed or incapacitated. Time for the collective to escape, to leave its doomed ship to find haven in other place. There was nowhere to go. The habitats orbiting Pluto were nothing but clouds of radioactive dust, there were no more ships to use. Overcomed by fear the most advanced mind ever created by mankind assisted in shock at the last phase of the enemy attack. The “Roma” impacted at full speed, guns still blazing in full automatic, the starboard side of the “Chang'e” with cataclysmic violence. The shock wave was so powerful to split open two thirds of the Chinese flagship, exposing its core to the space. The last thought of the collective was death.

***

The impact obliterated more than half of the European warship, including the main deck. In a matter  of a second eleven damned souls found their eternal peace, their dead bodies consumed by unsustainable pressures. Two of the engines of the “Roma” remained operational, pushing the entangled ships in the direction of Pluto. The longest war in the modern era was finally over.

***

Half a million kilometers far, the last planet of the solar system was ready to receive its first visitors. For a planet denominated with the name of roman god of the underworld, receiving a load of dead warriors was more than appropriate.