quickly populating tactical map of the area around them.
Pandem was still minutes away at full thrust, but there was a veritable gauntlet between the Triton and the green and blue planet. Ashley jerked the controls, sending the ship several degrees to port, towards one of Pandem's outer moons. “Oh my God,” she whispered under her breath as she watched the tactical map light up.
Alice stared at the main holographic tactical projection in the center of the bridge and her spirits dropped. Without realizing it, she found she was slowly standing to get a better look.
There were hundreds of destroyers, corvettes, battle cruisers, carriers, several larger combat platforms and at least five command carriers at a glance. Their markings were clear, there was no long range signal jamming in the battlefield, and Regent Galactic, the Order of Eden as well as the Carthan Defence Fleet were represented. As the tactical display continued to populate with thousands of fighters, gunships and other medium sized close combat vessels appeared between the furious juggernauts that had joined the fray that extended past Pandem's outer orbit and all the way down to the upper atmosphere.
“Cloaking systems?” Alice asked the bridge in general and everyone not in direct control of the energy fields and suppression systems held their breath in anticipation of the answer.
“Emissions are contained, we're not putting anything out there,” Finn reported from his engineering station.
“Our gravity shielding is working as a counter to anything that can detect our mass. Anything running a sensor sweep through our area should read zero,” Laura reported.
“The hull is bending all spectrums of light around the ship and no one has started scanning or firing on us,” Agameg reported. “We are hidden.”
There was a collective sigh of relief as Ashley guided the Triton into a course that kept them thousands of kilometres away from the battle and would take them behind the third Pandem moon.
“I don't know for how long,” Agameg added. “Interdiction particles are spreading from several of the Regent Galactic carriers in all directions, if we encounter them we will be visible to most scanners.”
“And our hyperspace systems won't work,” Alice added.
“Actually, they will. Our gravity shields will keep the interdiction particles from interacting with the hyperspace emitters,” Laura corrected. “Then again, if we come near that expanding field of interdiction particles our gravity shields will displace them in a larger radius, making us look like we're about five times our size.”
Alice looked at the profile of the Triton on the status display projected by her command chair. It was an unusual ship, modelled after a sea stingray from Earth she was much broader than she was long, unlike most vessels that were built lengthwise for easier hyperspace and wormhole travel. “That could work to our advantage.”
“So we're hidden at the moment but how do we let Jake know we're here without sending a big flare up?” Stephanie asked in a whisper.
Alice sat down and stared at the tactical display, a hornets nest of red, blue, green and yellow ships between them and the green blue ball of Pandem. “I think I have an idea,” she whispered back.
“You're kidding,” Stephanie whispered back with a restrained look of surprise and amusement.
Alice thought for a long moment, watching the tactical display. Triton was entering a wide orbit around the Pandem moon and they were safe for the moment but less than seven hundred kilometres behind three Regent Galactic carriers. The most important part of their location was that there was little to no chance of them being struck by stray munitions or of them colliding with anything in the area. “Ashley's team is really good,” she said quietly as though realizing for the first time.
Stephanie was pretending to watch the security status panel so she wouldn't stare at the woman in the Captain's chair. “She's always learning.”
“I know, seems this ship rewards hard work,” Alice said as she brought up a large rail cannon munitions list and started searching. “If I didn't spend days looking through specifications and fabrication lists for the materializers I don't think I would have found this,” she said, finding what she was looking for and pointing at it.
“That's a rail cannon transmitter round.”
“Yup, made for sending thousands of emergency beacons in every direction if the ship gets into trouble, but in this case we only need a few dozen.”
“Won't they find us?” Stephanie said quietly with a gesture to the frantic scene on the main display.
“Not in time, we'll launch them while we're on the move and change directions,” Alice replied as she opened a channel to Frost. “I'm sending you a request to manufacture two hundred of these rounds in four cartridges. I want four adjacent turrets to fire the rounds towards Pandem without hitting anything. Program them with this message and be ready to fire on the target I'm marking on my order.”
“Aye, squawker rounds, try ta miss everythin' but that island. Those'll be loaded in two minutes.”
“Keep the turrets as covered as you can and when you've fired the volley retract them.”
“Aye, we'll roll 'em out, pop the shots off then draw the turrets back so the hull can close up over 'em up,” Frost confirmed.
Alice turned her attention to the bridge in general then. “All right, we're going to send a message to Captain Valance. I need you to plot a course that takes us as close to the planet as is safe. I want to send these transmitters straight for Damshir, so keep that in mind.”
“That's the busiest section of space,” Larry countered, half turning in his seat. “And we'll have to shadow the largest ships in the area to avoid getting caught in an interdiction particle wave.”
“That's where we have to be, make it happen.”
“Aye,” he replied irritably as he turned to face forward.
“Cynthia, start a repeating search for anything that matches the Captain's, Jason's or Oz's voice and image profiles.”
“We're searching now,” she replied from the communications station.
Negotiations
The hard floor of their refuge showed the scars, black dirt and other marring that came with a broad hallway intersection being overused. Beyond the improvised, welded and piled barriers Oz knew that the surfaces were still white, blue, black and in some places gold. Whereas the refugees and rebels had expanded their territory in the spaceport with the help and direction of Dementia before, they were being corralled and cornered without their connection to him.
Oz sat eating a thick, simulated chocolate flavoured meal bar with Jason who was cross linking his portable terminal with the spare command and control unit he wore so it could take over all of it's functions. They both watched Ayan and Yves speak in a corner just far enough from the hundreds camped out and guarding the cramped space so they couldn't be overheard. The calm discussion had already turned into an argument.
If they'd only listen to us. Ayan can't get through to Yves even in conversation between just the two of them and she's actually got the full range of officer's training including the diplomatic component and annual upgrading. Not only that but she's probably one of the most reasonable people I've ever known. Yves just won't hear it, but everyone here listens to him even though he's a power tripping extremist.
Oz was just starting to chomp down the last bite of his meal bar when Yves broke out into a full on yell; “Listen, if you and your friends want to join up with whoever made it out of that mountain, go ahead. I'm closing the tunnel and that's all there is to it!”
Neither Jason or Oz could hear Ayan's reply, but she was keeping her cool remarkably well.
“We're going to finish cutting those ships free,” Yves shouted, pointing towards the old generic freighter and the two intact drop ships. “And get the hell out of here!”
“If the anti-air guns don't shoot you down what's in orbit will! I'd say it's suicide if it were just you but you're making this decision for hundreds of people!” Ayan shouted back, more for the benefit of the crowd laying around, guarding the barricades and walking amongst the refugees than out of anger.
“What do you suggest? Going further underground? Wait for this friend of yours to swoop in and pick us all
