DLS-387, Hell System (Revelation-II) Farspace
With its usual stomach-churning lurch, 387 dropped out of pinchspace 19 million kilometers out from Hell system.
In seconds, Mother had begun to build up the normalspace tactical picture of Hell system, the threat plot blossoming with hundreds of red Hammer intercepts.
“This all seems very familiar.” Armitage grunted as the threat plot filled up with red symbols marking the mass of long-and short-range radars, lasers, and radio frequency and other emitters that infested the Hell system. One by one, Mother analyzed each intercept and downgraded the threat it presented, turning the symbols to orange as she did so. The tension in the combat information center visibly decreased as the threat plot finally changed to all orange.
“Captain, sir. Command. Threat plot is orange, ready to conduct vector alignment and deploy pinchcomsats.” Hosani didn’t try to keep the relief out of her voice. Dropping out into normalspace was bad enough. Dropping into hostile normalspace was ten times worse.
“Approved. Stand the ship down from general quarters and revert to defense stations. I’m going for a walk-around and then to my cabin.”
“Sir.”
Extravehicular activity conducted while the ship was doing 150,000 kilometers per hour was never popular, and this time it was even less so. Michael and his team were denied the protection of 387’s short-range defensive lasers, which normally were tasked with picking off any space debris that got too close to the drone team. The chance that Hammer sensors would pick up laser fire was simply too great. The risk was very real. The death of three of Bombard’s crew doing a routine drone launch five years earlier-the spacers had been drilled through one after the other by a single fragment of rock only millimeters across that had been let pass by a defective short-range laser-was all the reminder Michael’s team needed that what they were doing was a very risky business.
It was from the heart that Michael heaved a sigh of relief as the surveillance drone team finally maneuvered the last pinchcomsat out of its protective container and clear of 387.
“Command, Alfa. Pinchcomsats deployed. Containers closed and secured. Returning,” Michael commed as he and the team scrambled to get back inside 387.
“Alfa, command, roger.”
Ten minutes later, the six pinchcomsats were boosted on their way to take up their positions in orbit 4 million kilometers out from the gray-black mass that was the planet Revelation-II. Their tiny low-power pinchcomms arrays had been locked successfully on to the pinchcomms carrier wave transmitted by a temporary tactical pinchcomms relaysat drifting in deepspace 2 light-years out from the Revelation system.