Task Force 683, Revelation System, Hell Outerspace
One after the other in quick succession, the four deepspace heavy patrol ships of Task Force 683 dropped into normalspace over 30 million kilometers out from Hell, their arrival announced only by the briefest flashes of ultraviolet.
The Atsumi’s combat data center was quiet as Commodore Kawaguchi and her staff watched the ship’s three consorts-Almohades, Ashanti, and Akkad-take loose station 2,000 kilometers apart, the ships invisible on the holovids against the brilliant tapestry of stars that curtained the skies. Within one minute of dropping, BattleNet was up and Atsumi, using the 6,000-kilometer baseline provided by the four ships’ sensors, started the slow and painful process of scanning the huge volume of space ahead of them before slowly rotating the line to cover the space to port and starboard of the original line.
This was a very unpopular maneuver, with captains understandably concerned about exposing their ships’ poorly armored sides to any loose rock or debris in their path as the ships coasted in-system at 150,000 kph. But it had to be done.
Slowly the ships’ sensors sucked data from every part of the electromagnetic spectrum and from every direction. The massive sensor AIs crunched terabytes of data a second as the threat plot located and displayed every ship, every satellite, and every fixed installation in the Hell system, all prioritized by proximity and threat.
Kawaguchi could see it all, feeling godlike as she looked down on the Hammers going about their business, unaware that they were being watched.
Even from more than 30 million kilometers away, she could see the characteristic signature of a Hammer mership. Judging by her vector as it boosted out-system en route, it was bound for the planet Faith in the Retribution Star system 3.75 light-years away. Farther out, a Hammer warship boosted out-system. It was an old Constancy class light escort judging by its electromagnetic profile and was identified by Mother as the Conciliator. Not a problem.
The long drawn-out process went on, the sensors gradually sorting the electronic chaos into an orderly picture of Hammer activity across trillions of cubic kilometers of space. Most important, Kawaguchi was relieved to see the threat plot turn and stay a uniform orange. Her orders were very specific. She was to jump back into pinchspace immediately irrespective of vector the instant the threat level escalated to red.
“Command, command AI.”
“Go ahead.”
“Threat plot is orange. Mission prime directive met. Ready to commence deployment.”
“Command, roger. Deploy.”
For five minutes, the local plot showed nothing more than the four warships, now back in a loose line abreast, coasting in-system. And then, from each ship there began to emerge a growing line of little dots, each dot representing a single Sandfly deepspace starship simulator, all shepherded clear by unseen EVA teams.
With a flattened, stealth-coated ovoid cross section broadening sharply out into a blunt bow making it look like a hammerhead shark, the Sandfly was the Federated Worlds’ latest and most sophisticated deepspace ship simulator. It was able to replicate any ship, from the most dilapidated tramp mership running the trade routes to the Far Planets up to and including the Feds’ latest, the Seagirt class deepspace heavy cruiser.
The Sandfly came complete with a boost engine aft, double redundant microfusion plants amidships, and banks of transmitters forward capable of simulating almost any active emitter ever built, from the 10-meter VHF radio band through all the radar and satcomm bands, military and civilian, up to 400-nanometer ultraviolet comms lasers. Together with Krachov microshrouds, active jammers, radar echo enhancers, AI-controlled voice spoofers, pinchspace drop simulators, and all the other tricks of the electronic countermeasures world, the Sandfly was an impressive piece of equipment.
Today, Task Force 683’s job was to send 120 of them straight down the throat of an unsuspecting Hammer.
Not that the starship simulators would look like FedWorld warships when the time came. No, that would be too obvious. When they went active, they would look like no warships the Hammer had ever seen, and then, when their job of thoroughly confusing matters was done, they would explode into dust. Probably the most expensive dust ever, Kawaguchi thought cynically.
Three hours later and the deployment was complete. The starship simulators were arrayed in a rectangle 8,000 kilometers across and 2,000 high, the classic heavy battle fleet formation for a direct attack on a heavily defended planetary system.
As the starship simulators took up station, they were followed by a cluster of pinchcomsat killers, each one a small football-sized black sphere mounted on top of a small boost engine and carrying a fuel cell, a close-range attack laser, an integrated star/inertial navigation system, and a tiny low-power optical targeting system.
“Command, command AI. Ready to launch.”
“Command, roger. Launch.”
And with that, 136 stars flared into existence as booster rockets smashed the starship simulators and pinchcomsat killers on their way toward their targets and then, just as quickly, winked out, their job done.
“That was pretty,” Kawaguchi murmured.
Five minutes later, Kawaguchi and her ships jumped into pinchspace.