Chronicles of Sol: The Fall

Countryman hurried down the corridor. The ground suddenly shook around him, but he was prepared. Stopping to brace himself as the ground shook. He sighed, and continued on his way. He knew what was going on up there. The fight wasn’t going well, and several Cathamari ships had begun attacking the planet. Star Tech HQ was likely identified as a priority target. It was an important facility afterall. Alarms blared as he moved down the corridor. The base would be fine for a few minutes longer, thanks to the heavily reinforced construction of the facility. In fact he calculated they had a little over half an hour before the surface levels of the facility failed, and a bit longer here in the lower levels. It was here that Earth coordinated its development of advanced starship technologies. The facility even had those new-fangled planetary shields. They had come out of the Mercury project, but had been found to be useful for more than just blocking radiation. They weren’t enough to stop the Cathamari plasma projectiles, but they did reduce their effective power a little. As such, all key ground facilities had them now. They just did not have a cost-effective version for use on ships, like the Cathamari did.

Rounding a corner as the facility shook again, he reached the hanger, and hurried inside. He was greeted by the sight of a massive ship. Earth’s most advanced starship, first of her kind. The EFS Enterprise and she was a beauty. The huge ship featured an elongated saucer with an indented hull. At the rear of the hull, a swept-back tower led to a disk-shaped secondary hull. Sweeping down and back from the secondary hull to the level of the primary was a set of connecting struts that linked to the nacelles. A second set of thick struts linked back to the primary hull. The massive ship itself was resting on a series of massive landing struts that kept its bulk above the reinforced hanger floor.

The ship itself was five thousand and twenty meters long. It sometimes boggled the mind that the ship was even capable of sitting on the ground much less able to be ground-launched. The secret to that ability however lay in her primary sublight drives. The ship was powered by a series of Pulse Wave engines. A reactionless drive technology based on a substance called Rydium. The accidental discovery of Rydium in 76 was momentous, and the substance itself soon found applications in propulsion, weaponry, and armor. Modern armor in fact relied on it for its very operation. The pulse wave engines that provide thrust for the Enterprise employ a Rydium based core that is bombarded with a series of particle streams. This produces a series of em and graviton-based emissions that a specially designed chamber focuses into pulse waves. These spatial-gravitic pulse waves have the benefit of partially nullifying the mass of the equipped ship and allow for the impressive maneuverability of human-built ships.

An Ensign greeted him as he entered the hanger, then she promptly asked, “Your credentials please.”

He had to respect her for still doing her job despite the circumstances. He showed her his credentials. She smiled as she looked over his credentials, although he noted a hint of worry in her eyes. It seemed she was trying to distract herself from the shaking. “Ah! Commander Countryman. Captain Reynolds was just asking for you. You better go see him, I think he is over by the main ramp supervising the loading of supplies.”

He smiled, trying to help distract her from the bombing, “Thank you Ensign. I’ll go see what the Captain wants.”

Countryman hurried along towards the ramp. Occasionally having to brace as the ground shook from the continued bombardment. Sure enough, he found Reynolds supervising several workers doing the last-minute loading of supplies and equipment. They were taking just about everything they thought they could use. As they were evacuating the base as well. Star Tech HQ was a facility they could not risk falling into Cathamari hands.

Reynolds noted his approach, “Ah, Commander, I was just looking for you.”

“I heard. How may I be of assistance?” said Countryman as he noted the captain’s expression. He seemed rather stoic and unconcerned by the bombing, but Countryman noted a slight bit of concern in his eyes. He hid it well, which is good given his position.

Reynolds shifted his stance, and schooled his features, “I’ll get to that in a moment. I am curious though, do you have any idea why command assigned me a scientist for a first officer?”

“Beyond the fact that I designed the Enterprise? Well, there is the fact that I was the lead engineer supervising her construction. Not to mention I also have prior command experience. Command figured you would need someone familiar with the ship to advise you as well.”

“I see. Well I haven’t had a chance to read your file, but it was rather thick. I guess an old fossil like you gets around.”

Countryman chuckled, “I do, but when you have lived as long as I have, you do get around.”

“Yeah, it will take some getting used to having a first officer older than I am.”

That was something Countryman got a lot. Since he was a hundred and ninety-one years old, Countryman was used to often being the oldest person in the room. His age was only possible due to modern medical technology and his status as a cybernetically enhanced human. He could expect a few more centuries of good health in fact, thanks to that status. Not that most people would notice his enhanced status. His only visible sign of enhancement were his eyes, and that was only if you looked closely.

“Anyway, we will see how good of an officer you make for me. In the meantime, I could use a rundown on my new ship. Command seems to have been slow getting me the files on it.”

Countryman chuckled, “I can do that alright. The EFS Enterprise is the newest and most advanced ship we have. First thing I would like to point out is that we haven’t had the time to optimize her systems or make sure everything is running to spec.”

“Noted, I was already told that the armor is only operating at forty percent effectiveness. Then he gave Countryman a look. Anything you can do about that?”

“I might be able to. I’ll have to be in engineering for that.”

“Then go ahead and get started on that, after we get aboard. But first, give me that rundown.”

Countryman nodded and got started, “The Enterprise makes several important improvements over older ships. Thanks to the Warp Three project and the Carrington project the ship is outfitted with a new first-generation warp drive. The warp drive is a new, mostly experimental, faster-than-light drive that functions by folding space around the ship. This process creates an intense spatial bubble around the ship that also has the side benefit of ripping apart any large debris that passes into the bubble and redirecting energy weapons fire as well. As such combat at warp speed won’t be possible Although the bubble won’t stop translight particles from interacting with the hull. At lower speeds we can tune the warp field to deflect most of those particles, but tuning the field loses effectiveness as speed increases. For most impacts however our hull plating should prove more than sufficient.”

Reynolds nodded, “Noted. Anything else I need to know about this warp drive?”

Countryman smiled, “Yes. The engine is only rated for a cruise speed of warp three which is about ten times the speed of light. If I had more time I have ideas that could, in theory, get that up to warp four, which is about a hundred times the speed of light. A much better speed for interstellar travel.”

“I can see that. At ten times the speed of light it will take months to travel between systems. At a hundred it would be reduced to weeks.”

Countryman nodded, “Yes, that covers it. Anyway, the warp drives energy requirements required the Enterprise to mount a much more powerful power plant than previous ships. She is powered by a dual-core antimatter reactor and eight primary fusion generators. This also provided her more power to spare for defensive systems than previous ships her size would have had. While officially she is classed as being a Heavy Cruiser, she has the size and armor of a battleship. In fact she should prove harder to damage than most battleships. She features an improved variant of the standard Overlord armor. She features 12 meters of uniform armor thickness covering all sections, the plate is standard Titan alloy but we replaced the old shock gel with a new version that has proved able to disperse and absorb nearly fifteen times more energy than the previous generation of shock gel. This improvement was needed to absorb translight impacts, but it also greatly extends how long the Enterprise can hang in a firefight. As it also helps absorb the explosive shock of torpedo hits, and high energy kinetic impacts.

“The armor also features an improved energy absorber scheme, and dispersion field set up. The new absorbers should be able to absorb twice as much energy as the old, and will shunt it into the armor integrity field more efficiently. Tests indicate that this has greatly extended the resilience of the armor.”

Reynolds nodded. The captain was likely just as familiar with Overlord armor as Countryman was. The AIF (armor integrity field) was an energy field that was run through the plates and was directly responsible for maintaining the armor’s integrity. A field that was generated by circuitry that was directly integrated into the plate. The AIF was largely why the armor was able to resist Cathamari plasma weapons instead of being vaporized with each impact. The dispersion field, on the other hand, worked to scatter incoming energy weapons fire forcing it to hit a wider area. Not only reducing its penetrating power but also allowing a greater number of energy absorbers to absorb the energy of each hit. Allowing more energy to be shunted to the AIF or if the field was already saturated to a series of capacitors. In theory, the armor’s absorbers could be used to power any system on the ship. In some cases, that energy was also used to speed up weapon recharge rates.

He was also likely familiar with Titan alloy and the armor’s composition so there was not much need to go over that. Titan alloy was based mainly on titanium but contained a few other metals in its makeup. The most notable element was the presence of Ryduim in the alloy which magnified its responsiveness to the AIF field. Increasing its resilience while being actively reinforced. Each plate was also treated with a special reflective polymer compound that not only helped absorb sensor pulses but was also very resistant to thermal gradients. That material combined with the dispersion field made it very difficult to detect the Enterprise without a spatial sensor array.

“I take it the enhanced dispersion field is also more effective at scattering incoming energy projectiles?”

“It is alright. We noticed a ten percent improvement in field tests. Although at the moment we still need to optimize the systems. It won’t function at full potential until we make those optimizations.”

“Noted.”

“For sublight propulsion, the ship is equipped with five primary pulse wave engines and a pulse detonation drive. She can outrun most modern cruisers on sublight easily, and can outmaneuver any ship the Cathamari throw at us. As for weapons, the Enterprise is outfitted with two primary heavy cutting beam arrays. Her main battery contains eight banks of heavy particle cannons, and she has a secondary battery of medium particle cannons. She also features fore and aft RF torpedo launchers. For engaging light craft, she is outfitted with triple tube photon missile launchers. She does have one weapon I think will interest you. She has been outfitted with a new weapon system that was found to be rather effective at defeating Cathamari energy shields. She is equipped with an array of Electro cannons.”

“Electro cannons? I can’t say I am familiar with that weapon.”

“It was originally developed for the Carrington project. As the goal of that project was to capture a Cathamari ship intact, they needed a weapon capable of disabling them. The Electro cannon fires a highly charged electrostatic plasma pulse that can overload energy shields and disrupt ship systems. It proved invaluable for the Carrington project, and should prove quite useful to us as well. The only problem is its range is a bit limited. It has a range half that of our standard ship-to-ship particle cannons.”

He nodded, “That does sound useful. Especially since our particle cannons aren’t that effective against those shields of theirs. Any other useful new weapons?”

Countryman nodded, “The Enterprise replaces the older fusion torpedoes with the new photon torpedoes. Like old gen designs the new photons include a shield penetrator allowing them to occasionally bypass Cathamari energy screens, but the new photon warheads are twice as powerful as standard mark five fusion torpedoes.”

“What is the shield penetration rate on these new photons?”

“38% an improvement of 2 percent over the old mark fives.”

Reynolds looked over the ship. “Not much but that helps.”

“Every bit does. The Enterprise as you may have noticed has its own hangers and is designed to carry the new X-1204 starfighter, but right now we only have four squadrons of this new fighter. She was supposed to have more, but production of the remaining fighters has not yet been completed. We might be able to complete them later however. As the Enterprise has been outfitted for a long-term mission, she is equipped with Nano-fabricators.”

“That reminds me, what mission was she designed for?

“Long-range exploration and tactical assault. To that end, she was outfitted with everything needed for an extended duration mission. Advanced self-repair systems, nano fabricators, extensive cargo bays, internal hydroponics, water reclamation. We intended for her to be able to sustain herself as long as needed. In theory, she could operate in deep space indefinitely. At least as long as she had fuel and materials for spare parts that is, and since we couldn’t guarantee that she would always have access to a port. We outfitted her with an industrial bay able to not only manufacture anything she needs, but also refine raw ores and process fuel. We even designed her with eight repair arms able to repair hull damage to not only herself but any friendly ship assigned to her battlegroup. She has four docking arms for that purpose as well.”

“You planned for just about any situation didn’t you?”

Countryman nodded, “One more thing you should note. The Enterprise is carrying a small supply of antimatter bombs. Intended for use in planetary bombardment.”

“Good to know.” Then he glanced at the workers. “Looks like we are about done here. We better get inside. I haven’t been to the bridge, has there been any change to that module?”

“No, it is a standard bridge module. Located near the top of the primary hull, and protected by reinforced bulkheads and secondary plating,” said Countryman. That was the usual spot for the bridge as well. While it might have been better protected deeper in the ship, in practice the deeper parts of the ship were better utilized for more sensitive components. Such as the main capacitors, the reactors, and magazines. Fuel pods were also kept deeper in the ship leaving less space for the bridge. The reason being that these things could explode if hit, or ignite, which could mean the whole ship.

“Great. I wouldn’t want to have to learn a new bridge design.”

The bridge, like all human bridges for decades, was split into two levels. The upper command balcony contained the captain’s chair. While the lower level was where the control banks were located. A 360-degree view screen gave the crew an all-around view of the ship’s surroundings. Near the front of the bridge was the helm, towards the left was the main tactical console, and the sub-tactical consoles. On the right were the engineering displays, and bridge consoles. Towards the rear were the operations, and science consoles. In the center was the strategic operations display. Behind the command balcony was a small hallway that led to the officer’s conference room, and the captain’s ready room. There was also a lift access point in that hallway.

They parted ways soon after entering the ship. Countryman did mention before heading for Engineering that he had not had time to go over every system. There was much left untouched.

Countryman arrived at Main Engineering a few minutes later. The room was located on deck 96. He was promptly greeted by the chief engineer, a young woman named Megumi Richards. She smiled, “Ah, sir. Glad to see you made it aboard. Have you spoken with the Captain?”

Countryman nodded, “Yes, I did. He is preparing the ship for launch. I am down here to assist with getting the systems optimized. We need to focus on getting the armor ready for battle, we are going to need it.”

Richards gestured to the consoles, “I figured that would be the case, and I already got started.”

Countryman nodded. “Then let’s get to work. See if we can’t get that armor efficiency up above 40.”

The two soon were sitting together at one of the console banks working away at getting the systems up and running.

Reynolds settled into his new command chair. His talk with Countryman had been interesting. He had not been entirely truthful about Countryman's file. He had actually read the highlights as soon as he got it. That man’s file had so much black ink in it that there was actually not that much for him to read. Hell, the man’s security clearance was higher than his own as well. Much of his work over the last century seemed to have been classified above his personal clearance level. Not that Reynolds knew what to say about that. What he really wanted to know was why the man held the rank of commander, and not admiral or higher. He had the clearance for it. Hell Reynolds suspected the man knew more about both the Carrington project, and the Warp Three project than he did. Both projects he was only recently granted clearance for.

In fact he had been briefed on some of the older projects like the Warp one project. That had been started on Mars some fifty years ago, but it had failed to produce a viable interstellar drive. After numerous setbacks and failures, the project was shelved. It wasn’t until five years ago that the project was deemed viable again. A year before first contact with the Cathamari, the first successful warp one engine was created, but this was deemed too slow for interstellar travel. This led to the start of the Warp three project whose goal was to create an engine capable of sustained travel at warp three. As it was determined that while warp one or two would be acceptable for interplanetary travel, interstellar would require at least warp three. The Warp Three Project was greatly accelerated thanks to the Carrington project which successfully captured a number of Cathamari ships for study. Including the all-important drive components. While no fully intact engine was ever acquired, much was learned from the fragments.

He glanced at the helm officer, a young man. “Initialize the engines.”

As the officer started, he glanced at operations, “Is everyone aboard?”

“Yes, sir. All departments report fully manned. All personnel accounted for.”

“Excellent. Secure all hatches,” he glanced at the engineer on duty, “Energize the plating.”

He leaned back, and turned to his own displays. Looking them over. He had a general ship’s status display, and database access right here at his console. He started a few pre-launch checks of his own. Noting a few systems that Countryman hadn’t mentioned like the Mag Tractors which seemed standard. Most ships had them anyway so nothing special there. He also noted the Energy Web projectors which were standard on most military ships. Energy Web projectors created a net of high-energy particle streams around a ship and were controlled by computer. They were a very effective missile and torpedo interception system, and could even be mounted on starfighters. He was glad to see it. Cathamari torpedoes were among the few weapons that could penetrate Overlord armor.

He then opened the database entries on the weapon systems to retrieve exact figures. Something Countryman hadn’t gotten to. The weapons on the Enterprise had higher effective ranges and yields than their counterparts on other ships in the fleet. A benefit of her improved power plant configuration. She also had much improved capacitors, able to store more energy. Looking through the entry on the cutting beams, he noted that the particle emitter had been redesigned to allow for a higher yield particle stream. According to the notes on the file, he could expect not only increased firepower but improved armor penetration. Reynolds was quite familiar with the cutting beams. They fired highly accurate sustained particle beams that could carve through ship armor. They also out-ranged standard particle cannons by a fair measure, but like the standard particle cannons, they were less effective against shields. Standard practice was to use them to sweep the hull of an enemy ship after her shields had failed. This would allow them to breach multiple compartments in short order. Not only damaging whatever was in those compartments but also opening them up to space. They were also more accurate than standard particle cannons, which made them useful in precision strikes. Such as a targeted strike on a target’s reactor.

Standard particle cannons fired focused particle pulses. He noted that the ones on the Enterprise featured an improved cooling system, and were modified to take advantage of the increased power generation. They featured a higher rate of fire, and higher particle density. As such they would fire faster, and hit harder. Particle cannons excelled at chewing through armor, and ship hulls. They didn’t have the range of sustained beam weapons or the accuracy though. The real advantage of pulsed weapons was that they fired faster, and required less robust cooling systems. That made them cheaper as well. Each shot also technically dealt more damage, but in practice beam weapons were more damaging. A fact that made one wonder why the Cathamari didn’t use sustained beam weaponry. At least he did until he read the files on the Carrington project. A study of their weapons revealed that their cooling systems were crude, and their plasma weapons produced a lot of heat. The short answer was that they simply couldn’t make a sustained beam version of their plasma weapons.

Still, despite their crude cooling systems, the Cathamari plasma cannons were impressive. They fired a concussive plasma pulse that struck with significant force. Smaller ships could not hold up long under a barrage from those cannons, but the Enterprise had enough armor to render them ineffective. At least once it was properly optimized. At 40% effectiveness, they might prove a threat, but unfortunately, they could not stay here long enough to optimize it.

Turning from the database, he checked on his officers. The helmsman reported that the engines were in the final stage of initialization. That meant they could lift off soon. He did a quick check with the other officers, and then called engineering. While also noting that his second officer Greyman wasn’t on the bridge. Countryman answered after a moment.

“Engineering. Richards is busy at the moment, what can I help you with?”

“Was just checking how things are going down there. Made any progress with the armor, and have you seen Greyman?”

“Yeah I have seen our second officer. He is helping out down here. As for the armor, we have made some progress. We have increased the forward armor efficiency by about 2 percent. Not much, but it should help a little.”

“That is good. I was looking through the database and noticed mention of a shield system on the Enterprise. Anything you can tell me about that?”

Countryman replied, “I’d leave it alone for now. They aren’t rated for combat. The shields are experimental, and designed to provide supplementary radiation protection. Useful if we get too close to a star, but won’t help much in battle. They won’t have much, if any, effect on Cathamari concussion plasma weapons. The power would be better put to use elsewhere in a fight.”

He nodded. That sounded reasonable, “I see. I’ll let you go then.”

Closing the channel he turned back to the bridge. To oversee the rest of the preflight checks. After a few moments, they were ready. He gave the orders.

“Retract all landing struts, and open the bay doors.”

“Aye, sir.”

On the screen the massive bay doors above the Enterprise retracted. Water began flooding into the hanger. Rushing to fill the underwater hanger. In seconds it would be flooded. Already ocean water was pouring over the hull. No one was worried about the water though as the hull was sealed and it wasn’t going to care about a little water. He waited for the doors to be fully opened. Then he gave the order.

The ship rose from the ground. Easily rising out of the hanger, and cutting through the water with ease. In mere moments she broke the surface of the water. A rain of plasma struck the surface nearby, and stray bolts even hit the ship. It shuddered on contact with the bolts, but the plating seemed to be holding.

He noted two other ships breaking the waves nearby. Both of them were smaller than the Enterprise. They were destroyers. He had been briefed about them. They were also products of the warp three program, and they were classified as X-1212. They were designed as escorts for the Enterprise, but only these two ships had been completed. That was about all he knew about them though. As his briefing on them had not covered much about them.

Checking the database as they ascended, he noted that they had a single cutting beam array. A single Electro cannon array, a few medium particle cannon batteries, fore and aft torpedo launchers, and they were equipped with fusion mine dispersers. He noted a lack of missile launchers or light ship weapons meant for engaging light craft. That was the normal role for an escort destroyer. These two ships were clearly not intended for that role. They might have been ‘escorts’ but they were clearly attack ships, and armed accordingly.

He also noted the size of the ships, and their armor. Both destroyers measured 970 meters in length, and they only had three meters of armor. They could have benefited from more armor, but so could the Enterprise. Unfortunately, there were factors about modern powered armor technology that limited the thickness. The last thing he noted was the names of the ships, the EFS Coto, and the EFS Umikaze.

He put those thoughts and considerations aside moments later. As the Enterprise broke free of the atmosphere. He was greeted to the sight of stars, menacing Cathamari ships, and the furious exchange of weapons fire. Directly in front of his ship was a Cathamari destroyer with its distinctive predatory design. With its triangular forward section, followed by a rounded body from which a set of predatory wings swept back. It resembled some kind of alien bird swooping to attack. It was firing on the planet. From which vibrant streaks of blue were flying up to meet Cathamari ships. Occasionally, a blue stream of particles would strike a ship in orbit as well. As planetary defense batteries were actively firing on attackers.

He ordered the destroyer targeted. Moments later the hull of the Enterprise lit up, and she unleashed a fury of blue particle bolts. Charged particle bolts streaked across the short distance in an instant.

Bolt after bolt crashed into the targeted destroyer's energy screens. They glowed a vibrant red with each bolt that struck. They flickered with each hit, and then one went through. The bolt of energy that penetrated the screen slammed into the hull, and tore right through the plating. A small explosion followed, and then the energy barrier failed completely.

Seconds later the Enterprise sailed past the wrecked hull that resembled nothing more than a very holey piece of swiss cheese. Her mangled hull was already starting to break up as gravity pulled it into the atmosphere. The Coto, and the Umikaze sailed right past it seconds after the Enterprise.

Her entry onto the field was not unnoticed. As two cruisers broke off from a nearby Earth cruiser. An Osaka class by the looks of it. An older class that had served since the colonial wars. It was originally designed as an escort cruiser, and was armed accordingly with a large number of light particle cannons. It did carry a cutting beam, a few torpedoes, and some heavy particle cannons though. The class was remarkably sturdy, even if it did have only five meters of armor. However, in recent years it was slowly being replaced by the newer Tokyo class which was better equipped for engaging ship-to-ship.

The ship in question had taken a beating. Its hull penetrated in a number of locations, and from the looks of it, she had lost her main drive. She was still fighting though. A blue beam streaked across space to strike one of the cruisers pulling away from it. A quick glance at his screens gave him the ship’s name, the EFS Bismarck.

Glancing at the operations officer, he requested, “Status of the Bismarck!?”

“She has taken heavy damage to the primary hull. Main drives are out, hull plating has failed, and she appears to have lost power to several decks. She does still have power to her main weapons though.”

Reynolds took note of that, while also considering the threat of the approaching battle cruisers. The Bismarck had taken quite a bit of damage, but she wasn’t completely defenseless yet. Although she won’t last much longer without aid. The cruisers now on intercept course for his ship were still outside of effective engagement range, and that gave him a chance to look them over. At a glance he recognized them. They were Battle Claw class battlecruisers. A newer class that were heavily armed with large banks of Cathamari torpedoes.

He made a quick check in with Countryman. “How is that armor coming?”

“Slowly. Optimizing armor requires a lot of calculations, even for me.”

“Well you better hurry up because we are going to need it in about 30 seconds,” replied Reynolds.

A sigh came over the line, “I need more time than that.”

Reynolds closed the channel. They were probably going to get a little singed. Thankfully his own weapons have greater range than those on Cathamari cruisers. He would be getting the first shot.

He turned to tactical and gave the order. As the cruisers were in range. Several streaks of blue light rippled from the hull of the Enterprise. As the launchers fired in quick succession. A volley of photons closed the distance with the first cruiser in a matter of seconds. A series of bright flashes lit up the skies as they impacted the cruiser’s shields. The shields flared with each impact, but a few got through.

The cruiser survived her armored hull having withstood the volley. The cruiser was not undamaged though, as she had taken a couple of hull breaches. More importantly she had taken damage to her shield grids, and her shields were flickering. Leaving her open to a follow-up attack.

The damaged cruiser unleashed her payload of torpedoes, just as the Enterprise fired. Vibrant blue energy slammed into the cruiser seconds later. Her damaged shields absorbed some of the barrage, but numerous particle bolts slammed into the hull.

The red-orange bolts of plasma that the cruiser had launched meanwhile impacted a web of glowing red energy projected around the hull of the Enterprise. A few of them got through this web however, and slammed into the hull. The ship shuddered under the impact. While the second cruiser unleashed another payload of torpedoes.

He ordered immediate evasive actions this time, and tactical was ordered to fire on the second ship. The first ship was still intact, but she had taken heavy damage. He deemed her no longer a threat. He figured the other two ships could finish it off. Allowing him to focus on the other ship.

Two blue beams slammed into the second cruiser’s shields followed by a heavy barrage of particle bolts. The shields flared brightly but held under the barrage. While a number of the reddish torpedoes sailed under the Enterprise missing their target. They fired a volley of their own torpedoes at the cruiser. As the ship shook under the impacts of the torpedoes that did find their mark.

He cursed when he heard a hull breach reported. They were taking damage. Nothing serious, yet. He wished Countryman would hurry with getting the armor to full strength.

His volley of torpedoes quickly found their mark. Striking the second cruiser amidships. Most simply exploded on contact with the shields, but several struck the hull. The resulting flash of energy was brilliant, but the cruiser remained intact. Albeit barely. The second cruiser lost shields, and took heavy structural damage.

He was about to give the order to finish it off, when blue energy slammed into its hull. The Umikaze had opened fire on it. A quick glance at the screens showed that they had finished off the other cruiser. They had made quicker work of it than he thought they would.

He glanced at his screens. There weren’t any more Cathamari ships in the immediate vicinity. There were a few cruisers not too far away, but they were presently engaged. According to the IFF, the vessels involved were the EFS Paris, the EFS Aksay, and the EFS Maryland. They were engaged with nine Cathamari ships. All the ships involved had taken damage.

He glanced at the operations officer, “Order the Umikaze and the Coto ahead to aid the cruisers Paris, Aksay, and Maryland. Then open a channel to the Bismarck.”

She nodded, and after a moment, the Bismarck’s captain appeared on the screen. He seemed relieved.

“Thanks for the assist. A few more minutes and those cruisers would have had us.”

He smiled, “Glad we could help. May we be of further assistance?”

The other captain shook his head, “We will be fine. My engineers tell me they will have main drives back online in about three minutes. Hull plating might take a little longer, but this little corner of LEO is clear.”

He wished the other captain luck, and closed the channel. Before ordering a course towards that nearby engagement he had noted moments before.

By the time they had swept in, the Umikaze and the Coto had already sunk a ship each, and the three cruisers had finished off a third. Now only six Cathamari vessels remained in this little corner.

He targeted the nearest with a volley of torpedoes. It was already damaged, and the handful that made it through the shields proved fatal. The ship went up in a brilliant fireball that left only mangled Duranium behind. The act no doubt drew attention, but the battered ships here could not put up much of a fight.

In just a couple of short minutes, the other cruisers went down. Leaving him a moment to assess the ships they had just rushed in to assist. Thankfully without taking another hit. Countryman was still working on the armor.

“The Maryland reports critical damage, they are abandoning ship, sir. The Aksay reports moderate damage, and the Paris has taken heavy damage. Her engineers report they can have her combat-ready again in about twenty-three minutes.”

He acknowledged that, and then his operations officer reported, “Aksay says they are taking on the survivors from the Maryland, and will stay here to guard the Paris. The Bismarck has signaled that she is en route here and will be available to help protect the Paris if the Cathmari try to attack this area again.”

That was good news, and left them free to assist elsewhere if needed. Although he would prefer to stay in this little corner while Countryman finished with the armor. He had gotten it up, but they were still far from optimal. It was better progress than normal, but that didn’t make him feel better about how long it was taking.

Before he could much consider what course of action to take next. His operations officer suddenly reported, “Sir, we are receiving a distress call from the Baltimore. They report they are taking heavy damage, and are in need of immediate assistance.”

He ordered a course set immediately. While in his mind he recalled the details of the Baltimore. She was a Tokyo class heavy cruiser. The ship had a crew complement of over a thousand, and he was familiar with the captain. Captain Mary Williams, a downright pain in the ass. At least she was good at her job, but she wasn’t all that popular among her fellow captains. She was especially unpopular among those who were cybernetically enhanced. She made no secret of her distaste for cyborgs and had a tendency to antagonize anyone who was enhanced. He made a mental note to keep her and Countryman apart. Those two would not get along. Maybe he would get lucky, and she would already be dead when he got there?