The Synchronicity War Part 2 (2 page)

“Okay, Iceman. The mission objectives are the
total destruction of that alien fleet. With that as your goal, you
have my permission to commence that attack plan.”

“I won’t let you down, CAG.” Almost immediately,
Defiant’s engines started pushing her onto a new vector. The main
display showed a countdown to a microjump. Shiloh’s station started
showing increased activity in the Hangar Bay as the support teams
began to load more attack drones onto each fighter. The moment that
Shiloh had been dreading, being in command of a major battle
WITHOUT any reliable vision to guide him, was now upon him. If this
plan went wrong, and he survived the battle, Howard would be within
his rights to court martial Shiloh. It was time to roll the
dice.

PART 2

Chapter 1 - There’s Never A Pickle Around When
You Need One

The Bridge was very quiet now. Only the
occasional murmur as someone responded to another part of the ship
but everyone was speaking in hushed voices. Iceman and his strike
force had launched almost half an hour ago after Defiant made a
very careful microjump to a point, two light minutes from Green4A,
that Iceman had determined would avoid detection by the alien ships
IF they were on the exact opposite side of the gas giant as
expected. Since they hadn’t undergone an attack by 55 alien ships,
it appeared that the ship’s microjump had not been detected. It
hadn’t taken long to re-establish com laser link to both sentry
fighters, whose drones were still trying to detect the enemy ships
passively. There was a limit to how long they could wait for
passive detection before Iceman’s Strike Force entered the gas
giant’s atmosphere and lost contact with the ship. Iceman had
already determined, and Shiloh had approved the idea, that it was
pointless for the Strike Force to wander around inside the gas
giant’s atmosphere if they didn’t know where the enemy ships were,
so the recon drones would resort to active scanning at the last
possible moment when that data could still be received by the
Strike Force. Active scanning would alert the enemy to a Human
presence and they might abort their refueling operation. Iceman
would have to adjust the attack plans quickly enough to compensate
for any enemy action. This was the kind of lightning fast tactical
ability that only an Artificial Intelligence could display. It
occurred to Shiloh that A.I.s were way too valuable as tactical
commanders to continue to be used solely as fighter pilots. He was
certain that it’d be tough to convince Admiral Howard of that. But
something told him that A.I.s would be the key to winning this
war.

A glance at the chronometer showed that they had
less than 14 minutes left for passive detection by the drones.
Shiloh looked over to Tanaka, who was conning the ship from the
Helm Station. She must have felt his stare because she turned
around to look at him and gave him a slight nod of acknowledgement.
He nodded back and smiled. He’d been lucky to have good people
serving under him and Sumi Tanaka was no exception. What she lacked
in experience, she made up for with focus and energy. He wondered
how long the Space Force would let him keep her as his Executive
Officer. Probably not long. That was the price COs paid when the
Space Force was expanding as fast as it was now. Good people got
shoved upward as fast as possible. Shiloh suddenly realized that he
was hungry. He was about to contact the Galley to order sandwiches
and coffee brought up to the Bridge for everyone when his Command
Station console beeped softly. Another text message from
Valkyrie.

[
Turbulence wakes detected in upper
atmosphere. Minimum of 14 enemy vessels now refueling. 31 enemy
vessels detected in low orbit via silhouette against planetary
background. 10 vessels unaccounted for. Recon drones being
maneuvered closer. Trajectory data follows. End message
.]

Before Shiloh could ask, the Astrogator was
already anticipating his next order.

“We’re relaying the drones’ sensor data to the
Strike Force now, Commander.” Shiloh nodded his approval. So Iceman
would get his critical data in time. He would project the enemy
fleet’s orbit and time his Strike Force’s interception so that his
19 fighters would sneak up on them from below and behind. It
sounded good but Shiloh couldn’t help wondering where those missing
10 bogeys were. He checked the incoming sensor data parameters. The
drones were far enough away from the gas giant that, while it was
possible and even easy to observe the wakes, caused by ships
plowing through the upper atmosphere, the attempt to detect the
black silhouette of ships in low orbit against the planet’s lighter
background was pushing the optical sensors to their limits. It
could very well be that the other 10 bogeys were in fact also in
low orbit but the drones’ sensors hadn’t detected them yet. The
other possibility was that the missing ships were also refueling
but were underneath the 14 ships whose wakes were visible. The
turbulence wakes of the ships higher up might be hiding the wakes
from the ships below.

With the distance between Defiant and the Strike
Force, Shiloh knew that they wouldn’t get Iceman’s acknowledgement
of the drone data for another 4 minutes and reports of the actual
attack and its results would take two minutes to reach the ship
too. Shiloh looked at the chronometer again. 8 and 1/3rd minutes
until communication with the Strike Force would be lost due to
atmospheric distortion of the laser beam, another approximately 23
minutes until the Strike Force was in position to attack, then
another 2 minutes for news of the attack results to reach Defiant.
With over half an hour to go with nothing to do but sit and wait,
Shiloh called the Galley and ordered the food and coffee for the
Bridge crew.

With just under twenty minutes left before
Defiant expected to hear the attack results from the Strike Force,
Shiloh decided that this was as good a time as any, to practice a
leadership technique, taught at the Academy, called ‘Leadership by
walking around’. He remembered his Instructor telling the class
that Julius Caesar had allegedly practiced this technique one night
before a major battle, by walking around his army’s camp, going
from campfire to campfire with a pickle in his hand, which he used
to graphically enhance the telling of several obscene jokes that
made his soldiers roar with laughter.
There’s never a pickle
around when you need one
, he thought to himself with amusement.
He got up and strolled around the Bridge, chatting for a few
seconds with each of the Bridge personnel in a low voice that made
each conversation seem more personal and confidential. He found
that the mood of the Bridge crew was good. No one exhibited
excessive fear and a couple of them were downright eager for the
ship to exchange laser volleys with the enemy. Shiloh only smiled
when he heard that. Defiant class light carriers were not meant to
slug it out toe-to-toe with the enemy although they could defend
themselves if they had to. Her most powerful weapon was the
squadron of fighters that could pack a hell of a punch and launch
that punch at long ranges. When he had finished speaking with all
of the enlisted Bridge crew and was about to chat with the
Astrogator, the tactical display pinged for attention. A quick
glance at the chronometer showed that there was still almost 8
minutes left before the planned interception of the enemy force by
Iceman’s group. Looking back at the tactical display, Shiloh saw
another text message from Valkyrie scroll across the bottom of the
view screen.

[
Enemy ships in orbit have begun active
scanning. All recon drones have been detected and destroyed by
enemy laser fire. Contact with enemy force lost. No contact with
Strike Force. Sentry fighters have not been detected. Request
instructions. End message
]

Shiloh heard someone say ‘damn’ with feeling,
then realized that he had said it. He rushed over to his Command
Station, switched the open channel to Valkyrie over to his
implanted com device frequency and said.

“CAG to Valkyrie. Maintain current vector. More
instructions to follow.” With the message recorded, he touched the
Command Screen button to transmit it in a short laser micro-burst.
As he sat back down in the chair, he gestured for the XO and
Astrogator to step over to his Station. Both of them had grim
expressions on their faces. Shiloh tried to project an expression
of serene confidence as he looked at them.

“So they obviously know now that they’ve been
under surveillance. I doubt very much that they’ll still be in the
same orbit by the time the Strike Force gets there. If either of
you have any suggestions, now’s the time to offer them.” There was
silence for about five seconds.

“Can the sentry fighters launch more recon
drones?” asked Tanaka. Shiloh shook his head.

“Both of them launched all their recon drones in
order to make the initial contact. They still have a few message
drones and one attack drone, both totally unsuited for regaining
contact.” After a short pause, the Astrogator said.

“If our no. 1 priority now is to figure out
where this enemy force is headed next, I think I may have a way to
do it.”

“You’re right. That IS our no. 1 priority at the
moment. Go on.” said Shiloh. The Astrogator took a deep breath
before continuing.

“Well…assuming that they intend to penetrate
deeper into our inhabited space, there are only two paths they can
follow from here, that make any kind of sense and a limited number
of star systems that have gas giants that they can reach from
Green4. So we calculate the trajectories, that this enemy force
would have to take to reach those systems, and we deploy a net of
recon drones across both trajectories. The drones will use
intermittent active scanning with evasive maneuvers between scans.
That will reduce the chance of being hit by laser fire unless the
enemy ships get close. To prevent that, the drones will be
accelerating in the same general direction as the enemy fleet. In
fact, I would even recommend having more than one net of drones. If
the first net is destroyed, the 2nd net can continue to track them
and if necessary a 3rd net as well. If we manage it right, the 3rd
net can last until the enemy actually jumps away.”

“Which won’t do us any good.” said Tanaka
immediately.

“Why not?” asked Shiloh.

“If I was the alien commander and I saw wave
after wave of enemy recon drones retreating in front of me while
bombarding me with radar, it’d be obvious to me that the enemy is
trying to figure out where I intend to jump to next. So what I
would do is change the heading to aim at a completely neutral
destination, jump a couple of light years out of this star system,
and then reorient the fleet to my real destination.” The Astrogator
nodded.

“Yes, I agree. That would be the logical thing
to do.” he said.

“I’m still waiting for a USEFUL suggestion.”
said Shiloh. Neither of the other two responded. Shiloh leaned back
and looked at the ceiling for a few seconds, then said.

“Let’s assume that they weren’t finished
refueling when they detected and destroyed the sentry fighters’
recon drones. They could have easily changed direction and resumed
refueling. If that’s the case, then we may have enough time for
Iceman’s Strike Force to be redirected to engage in a stern chase
and maybe catch up to them before they break out past the gravity
zone boundary.” The XO and the Astrogator looked at each other then
back at Shiloh.

“What if the enemy fleet scans behind them as
they accelerate away from Green4A?” asked Tanaka.

“Would you give yourself away by doing that,
after going to all the trouble of destroying the enemy’s recon
drones in order to disrupt enemy surveillance efforts?” asked
Shiloh.

“Well, when you put it that way, I’d have to say
no but the Strike Force has to find them in order to be able to
attack them. How do we do that?”

“Good ques…” Before he could finish his
response, Shiloh’s vision went black and his hearing went silent,
all for about a second and a half. The blackness was replaced with
a familiar scene of him standing in front of Admiral Howard’s desk.
This time he could hear Howard clearly.

“Dammit, Shiloh, I don’t know whether to court
martial you or give you a medal! Dangling one light carrier as bait
in front of 55 alien ships? Despite the fact that you got away with
it, and took out enough enemy ships to just barely enable us to
stop the rest of them from attacking the Avalon Colony, I have to
seriously question your judgment, especially in light of Cmdr.
Tanaka’s report about your momentary paralysis, or whatever that
was, just before you announced your plan to put Defiant in Harm’s
Way. What the Hell is wrong with you, Shiloh? You got 30 seconds to
convince me that I shouldn’t relieve you of your command and have
you certified as a Class A nutcase!” The scene dissolved and he was
back on Defiant’s Bridge with both the XO and Astrogator looking at
him strangely.

“Are you okay, Sir? You seemed to enter some
kind of hypnotic state or something for a few seconds. You didn’t
respond to our voices and you didn’t even notice when I waived my
hand in front of your face a couple of times.” Tanaka’s voice
conveyed serious concern. Shiloh now knew that she would report
this incident when they got back but there was nothing he could do
about that.

“I’m fine now, XO. I guess I must have blacked
out there but I’m fine now. Let’s get our attention back to the
situation. You asked me how Iceman’s Strike Force can find the
enemy fleet in a stern chase without using active scanning. I know
how we can do it. Astro…use my console to add the trajectories that
the enemy would need to follow if they wanted to jump to the next
logical refueling stop for both paths, up on the tactical display.”
The Astrogator waited a couple of seconds before responding. It
didn’t take long for two red lines to appear on the display. Both
started at the same point in orbit around the Green4A gas giant and
the lines gradually diverged as they got further away from the
planet. Shiloh nodded his approval.