Exercise
© 2024 by Walter Reimer

Thumbnail art by  rabbi-tom

Opening Gambit

Admiral k’Jan stood in front of the cruiser Terzhin XXX’s holographic tactical display, the fingers of her left hand idly toying with the tip of her tail as she frowned. Captain g’Raf had taken her attacking force out of the j’Shavar System nearly three days earlier, and there had been no sign of any of the thirteen-ship detachment.

She was sure that the vir hadn’t decided to take her force to Jurkor for a vacation before attacking, but it would have been an interesting tactic. The thought made her smile.

Her own larger force was divided into two parts, with most guarding the base while the rest patrolled the system in small groups. A slightly doctrinaire defense, perhaps, but it was effective. Her ears flicked as the cruiser’s Sensor Officer called out to the ship’s commander. “Captain?”

“Report.”

“Several sensor arrays have declared themselves destroyed.” A full live-fire exercise would of course be wasteful in both materiel and shlani, so every ship had codes and programs fed into their fire-control computers to simulate damage or destruction. “Secondary arrays are coming online in three fractions.”

“Show me,” k’Jan said, and she frowned as a gap appeared in the system’s defensive network. “Communications.”

“Ma’am.”

“Signal to all ships not on guard to charge weapons and move toward the gap.”

The kam’s fingers danced across his console. His ears perked. “All comm channels are jammed.”

The captain asked, “Jammed?”

“Yes, Sir. Music, at least three – what?” He leaned back, one hand on the small receiver in his ear. “The only open channel is the direct channel to Fleet Command.”

“What?” the captain asked. “Show me.” A display over the communications console flickered and showed . . . Terrans? He became aware of Admiral k’Jan moving away from the tactical display to stand beside him, gaping at the images.

“What is Mansun Pōltrē Haspitol?” k’Jan asked, mostly to herself. The Fleet Command channel was reserved; she couldn’t use it to communicate with her forces. Communication masers were a good short-range backup, but many of the patrolling cruisers were several cycles away for messages dispatched at lightspeed.

She was now largely deaf and mute, and with several sensor arrays down, blind as well, but Fleet doctrine provided for this. If a ship found itself incommunicado, it was to rely on its own sensors and maintain the highest state of readiness.

As swiftly as it had happened, the jamming ceased, and ship’s ID transponders began to reappear in the tactical display as the secondary arrays took up the task of scanning for the adversary force. “Three ships that were in the sensor blackout report destroyed,” the Communications Officer said, “the Wrathful is reporting that the attacking force has inflicted severe damage and is requesting to fall back for repairs.”

“Acknowledge the report and assign the Praiseworthy to replace the Wrathful,” k’Jan said, eyes scanning the tactical plot, “and I want to speak with Wrathful’s captain.”

“The captain reports that their comm array is damaged. Visual contact is not possible.”

K’jan’s feline pupils dilated. “Very well. Audio only.”

“Captain k’Dar, Admiral,” the kam’s voice said. The plot showed the cruiser moving past the reinforcements, headed for the base’s dockyards.

“Analysis of the enemy’s tactics,” the vir said.

“When the sensors and comms were jammed, six ships attacked us,” k’Dar replied. “We were outnumbered, but inflicted damage on five of the ships before I disengaged.”

“Understood.” The cruiser was nearly at the dockyards. “I look forward to having dinner with you again after this exercise,” she said.

“As do I – “

“Fire on that ship!” K’Jan ordered. “That’s not Wrathful!”

As the sentries around the station darted toward the cruiser, its ID transponder in the display changed, from Wrathful to Princess Verit.

One of the opposing force.

It immediately moved toward the dockyards, firing constantly and inflicting heavy damage at extreme range before the defenders destroyed it.

As the damage was assessed, k’Jan grimaced ruefully. G’Raf was proving to be an interesting tactician.