The Synchronicity War Part 2 (15 page)

It was almost six hours later when everything
was ready and everyone was in their right position. 3rd Fleet had
made a series of microjumps that brought them to within 100 million
kilometers of Z12D and on a vector that would allow them to
microjump past Z12D’s gravity zone to the other side. VF002 under
Tumbleweed had launched hours ago and was now closing in on the
rendezvous point that was 36.5 million kilometers away from the gas
planet and just outside its gravity zone. TG 3.2’s frigates, each
one carrying a decoy drone, had separated from 3rd Fleet and was
now lined up for a carefully calculated microjump, that would place
them just in front of Tumbleweed’s fighters, at the same velocity
as the fighters.

Shiloh was strapped into the spare acceleration
chair with his Command Helmet on. The Fleet was at Battle Stations.
The Bridge seemed to be unnaturally quiet. Everyone knew what was
about to happen and were waiting for him to give the green light.
He checked the countdown timer projected on the inside of his
helmet. 45 seconds to go. TG 3.2’s microjump had to be executed at
the precise split second and would be controlled by computer. All
he had to do was withdraw the ‘hold’ command that was now in
effect. As the time hit 30 seconds, he reached up with his right
hand and deactivated the virtual Hold button. The Mission Status
indicator shifted from red to green. TG 3.2 was already over 55,000
kilometers away from the rest of 3rd Fleet but was still in
communication via tight beam com lasers. When the return beam
disappeared, that would be confirmation that TG 3.2 had jumped. A
fraction of a second after the timer hit zero, the communications
status with TG 3.2 changed from CON indicating contact to LOS
indicating Loss of Signal. The frigates had jumped and would emerge
from jumpspace almost instantaneously 53.5 million kilometers
closer to Z12D. From this point on, Shiloh would be out of
communication with VF002 and TG 3.2 until they rendezvoused on the
opposite side of the gas planet. That rendezvous would be tricky.
His carriers would have to be at the exact point where the fighters
and frigates expected them to be but that was quite a few hours
away yet.

In his mind, Shiloh went over the plan as to
what had to happen now. As soon as TG 3.2’s frigates emerged from
jumpspace, any alien detection stations would learn that six ships
had emerged from jump. The frigates would immediately launch their
decoy drones which the fighters would take up formation ahead of.
Once the decoys were launched, the frigates would swing around as
quickly as possible to a heading that would miss the gas planet’s
gravity zone, at which point TG 3.2 would microjump far enough away
to be sure of avoiding detection. It would then have to change
course again, microjump again and then change course once more, to
get to where the carriers would arrive after their microjump. When
the fighters and decoys got close enough to be detected by
reflected sunlight, the aliens would see exactly what they would
expect to see. Six (apparently) large ships escorted by a number of
very small craft that were decelerating towards the gas planet.
Tumbleweed was in command of the fighters and decoys. Shiloh had
carefully briefed him before launch. His orders were to veer off as
soon as the aliens opened fire. The fighters would not engage in
active scanning and they would only use their modular lasers if the
enemy decided to fire on them. As long as the enemy left them
alone, they would not fire back. It was a long shot to expect the
enemy not to fire on them but Shiloh could make the case for not
doing so. If he was the enemy commander, and he saw six big
targets, he would concentrate on those first. Once they were taken
out, he would evaluate the situation. Since the fighters had
already demonstrated at Green4, that they could make themselves
difficult targets to see and hit, the enemy commander would be
faced with a tradeoff. Firing at fast, elusive targets using
reflected sunlight only wasn’t likely to get a lot of results. If
the aliens started using active radar scanning, they’d be making
themselves into highly visible targets as well. If neither side
used active scanning, then exchanging laser fire was pretty much a
waste of energy, and in the case of the fighters, a waste of
precious fuel too. So went the theory but Shiloh was astute enough
to realize that these aliens might have a completely different way
of thinking about strategy and tactics.

He turned his attention to the second countdown
timer that was seconds away from 3rd Fleet’s own microjump. Unlike
the other one, this one would automatically go ahead unless Shiloh
aborted it and he had no intention of doing so. There was no longer
any point to his carriers staying where they were. If they were
going to be where they were expected to be at the right time, they
had to jump now. The microjump went off without a hitch. All three
carriers deployed a total of 24 recon drones that spread out to
form a detection perimeter using passive sensors only. When he was
satisfied that no enemy ships were anywhere near them, he ordered
the carriers to stand down from Battle Stations but remain on
heightened alert status. If there was no enemy presence near the
gas planet, Tumbleweed would send a message as soon as that was
confirmed, which would be in roughly 55 minutes but if there was an
ambush, Tumbleweed would not transmit any message, because that
might be intercepted and tracked, which meant they had a 2 hour
wait before they could expect to hear anything from Bettencourt and
a 5 1/2 hour wait before hearing anything from Tumbleweed. Such was
the nature of space battles fought over millions of kilometers.
Shiloh took his Command helmet off and sighed. He was tired after
being awake for almost 20 hours now. Before returning to his
quarters to get a few hours rest, he spent some time chatting with
Tanaka, Falkenberg and the rest of the Bridge personnel. Fleet
Admirals weren’t required to stand watches so the least he could do
would be to spend a few minutes boosting morale before catching
some sleep. No thoughts of a pickle now.

When he woke up 4 1/2 hours later, he knew that
Bettencourt’s TG 3.2 had arrived as planned without any problems.
If that hadn’t been the case, Tanaka would have notified him as per
his orders to her. There was also no point in asking the Bridge if
they had detected any signs of laser fire. At this range, laser
hits wouldn’t be bright enough to be seen. The fact that no fission
blasts from Mark 1 attack drones had been detected either meant
that nobody had used active scanning, which would have been
necessary to pinpoint targets for the drones to aim at. In order to
preserve the impression that there were no human ships left in
Zebra12, the fighters were under orders to hold off on trying to
contact 3rd Fleet until they were within 10 million km of the
rendezvous point and even then, communication would be one way. The
fighters would send out a highly focused burst of microwaves
towards where 3rd Fleet should be and away from the Z12D gas
planet. Any alien ships still near Z12D would not detect the
outgoing transmission and 3rd Fleet would wait until their recon
drones had direct and secure contact with the fighters using
rangefinder lasers and only then would 3rd Fleet respond back.

With almost an hour still to go before they
could reasonably expect to hear anything from VF002, Shiloh took a
hot shower, put on a clean, crisp uniform and grabbed some food and
coffee in the Officers’ Mess before heading up to the Bridge. To
his surprise he saw that Tanaka and Falkenberg were back even
though they would normally have been off duty now. Falkenberg saw
him first and before Shiloh could stop him, he said in a loud voice
that made some people jump with surprise.

“Admiral is on the Bridge!” Tanaka turned to
confirm the fact and then got up from her Command Station chair to
greet him.

“How did you know that they’d be waiting for us
at Z12D, Sir?” She understood that the lack of any communication
from VF002 meant that there had to be some kind of alien presence
there. Shiloh put on his most enigmatic smile and said,

“Just lucky.” Tanaka’s expression said that she
clearly didn’t believe him. Shiloh decided to change the
subject.

“Aren’t you supposed to be off duty now, Sumi?”
asked Shiloh. She shrugged.

“I did get a couple of hours sleep but I wanted
to be here when we get the word, Admiral.” He nodded and looked
around. “Any message from TG 3.2?”

“Yes, Sir. Bettencourt sent a message wondering
when his frigates are going to get refueled. I think he knows darn
well when but just wanted to vent his frustration, Sir.”

“Yes I think you’re right, Sumi. And now that we
know there’s some kind of alien presence at Z12D, it’s looking more
and more as though we’ll have to head back and refuel at Zebra10.”
Tanaka nodded slowly, her expression now one of worry.

“Unless they’ve moved to cover that one too
after we passed through, Sir.” Under other circumstances, Shiloh
would be worried too but not this time. If the aliens were
convinced that they had caught and destroyed the six ship fleet at
Z12D, then there was no reason to guard the back door. He patted
her on the shoulder.

“When we get there, we’ll be careful approaching
the GG. How long now before we can expect a message from
Tumbleweed?” Tanaka looked over Shiloh’s shoulder and said,

“Less than five minutes now, Sir, if they’re on
schedule.”

“Good. Well, I’ll just stand back here in the
background. Just pretend I’m not here, Sumi.” Tanaka smiled and
rolled her eyes as if to say ‘Oh sure, like THAT’s going to
happen!’

“As you wish, Admiral.” As she resumed her seat,
Shiloh stepped back until he could lean against the wall. The five
minutes seemed to take forever and Shiloh started to wonder what
had happened when the five minutes passed along with another minute
as well and still no contact. He was just about to ask the Comm.
Technician to set up a conference call with all of the Fleet’s COs
when the tactical display pinged for attention. Tumbleweed’s text
message scrolled across the bottom.

[
All decoys destroyed by laser fire from
multiple enemy ships. Number unknown. VF002 did not receive any
hostile fire. Recon drones deployed during escape did not detect
any signs of pursuit. The mission appears to have been
accomplished. End of message.]

Shiloh heard the Bridge personnel erupt into
cheering and clapping but he wasn’t celebrating. Something was off
here. Iceman’s vision implied that they would lose some of their
fighters otherwise why would his future self say that it was a good
thing that Iceman wasn’t part of the Zebra19 mission? It wasn’t
that he was hoping to lose some fighters but rather that he was
puzzled that he didn’t. When the background noise died down, he
walked back up to Tanaka’s Command Station and said to her,

“Pass the word to Resolute to recover VF002 as
planned. By then I want a jump plotted back to Zebra10 and
distributed to all ships. We’ll jump as soon as all fighters are
recovered.”

“Yes, Sir.” Shiloh walked over to the
Communications Station.

“I want to record a message for Tumbleweed to be
transmitted as soon as we have two-way communications.” The
technician nodded and said.

“I’m recording, Sir.”

“Admiral to Tumbleweed. You and your boys have
done an outstanding job. I’m proud of all of you. End of
message.”

“I’ll send that off as soon as we can, Admiral.”
Shiloh thanked him and left the Bridge for his quarters.

Chapter 9 - My Last Message Was NOT a
Request!

The trip back to Bradley Base took less time
because Shiloh felt it was safe to take longer jumps and therefore
less frequent refueling stops. The crews were happier too. Less
risk of enemy contact also meant that 3rd Fleet could refuel using
the supersonic method that was longer in duration but also more
comfortable. When 3rd Fleet emerged from its final microjump at the
edge of the Bradley Base gas giant’s gravity field, Shiloh was on
the Bridge in case there were any messages from either Korolev or
HQ waiting for him. Tanaka had the local space up on the tactical
display and Shiloh noticed that the moon with Bradley Base on it
was now in the gas giant’s shadow. The exact opposite to what it
was when the aliens had attempted to destroy the base and when
Angela almost got killed in an ambush.
An ambush by ships hiding
in the GG’s shadow.
That thought came as a surprise. Why would
he focus in on that one parameter? Before he could pursue that line
of thinking any further, the Bridge dissolved from his field of
vision to be replaced by Korolev’s image on what had to be the main
display but that’s all Shiloh was seeing. Just the display and
nothing else.

{Damage to the Base is serious but not critical.
We won’t have to abandon the Base thanks to your warning. I still
don’t know why you decided to deploy those recon drones when you
did but if you hadn’t, I and a lot of others would most likely be
dead now.} The image dissolved and he was looking at Defiant’s full
Bridge again. He quickly checked the tactical display with a new
question in mind. What should 3rd Fleet do to confirm the presence
and location of a suspected alien attack force? If the gas giant
was the center of a clock, the base moon would be at the 6 o’clock
position. This system’s sun would be at 12 o’clock which left the
moon in the gas giant’s shadow. 3rd Fleet was approaching on an
angle that was roughly 5 o’clock relative to the gas giant.
Distance to the base moon was still more than 35 million km. The
Base’s jump detection patrols would have detected their emergence
from jumpspace and Shiloh could see from the sidebar indicator that
Defiant had already sent the recognition signal to the Base, which
it wouldn’t receive for another 1.88 minutes. 3rd Fleet itself
wasn’t in the shadow and Shiloh could roughly estimate visually
that the Fleet was approximately 2 million km from the edge of the
shadow zone. Any enemy force in the shadow zone could already be
closer to the Base than 3rd Fleet was but it could also still be
further away, since it would have had to emerge from jumpspace much
further out in order to avoid detection. That left a huge volume of
space where they could be hiding. The shadow zone was a circle that
had an internal volume of billions of square kilometers and when
you added the length of the shadow out into deep space, you were
now talking about a significant volume of space.