The Battle of the Hammer Worlds

“Any final questions?” Eridani’s captain scanned the faces in front of her. “No? Okay. That’s all, folks. Go to it.”

The mission briefing broke up in noisy confusion around Michael. For a moment, he stared at the command plot with its mission summary. It all looked so easy, so clinical, he thought, laid out tidily like that. In theory, Eridani’s upcoming mission should be no problem at all.

He suppressed an involuntary shiver.

Remassed, rearmed, they were going back into Hammer space, this time as part of a task group-four heavy cruisers and four heavy escorts supported by light patrol ships-and it was no quick dash-in, dash-out job this time, either. The task group had orders to take out one of the battle stations in orbit around the planet Faith, the third planet of the Retribution system. According to the Einsteins responsible for planning Fleet operations, the mission was intended to demonstrate the Fed’s ability to operate freely even against targets as hard as a battle station, and Hammer battle stations were hard targets. Massing millions of tons, they were not quite as large as the Fed version, but in Michael’s humble opinion they were quite large enough and heavily armed. No rail guns, though, thank God. He was beginning to get a real bee in his bonnet about rail guns, to the point where he did not even want to think about the damned things, let alone jump into Hammer space to face them. He smiled ruefully. He would be packed off to the shrinks if Lenski ever found out.

He looked again at the mission summary and shook his head. How many times had he seen mission briefings end up so neatly packaged? He shook his head again. Things were never that easy-he should know-and there was no reason why this mission should be any different.

Doing his best to ignore a sudden twinge of fear that twisted his stomach into a ball, he turned his mind to the things he had to get done before the Eridani unberthed.

Twelve hours after the Eridani had arrived, Koh’s hydraulic rams pushed it gently clear. The minute the ship fell out from berthing stations, Michael headed straight for his bunk. He would be on watch in less than six hours, and his sleep deficit was beginning to get out of hand.

Thursday, March 30, 2400, UD

Defense Council Secretariat, city of McNair, Commitment

“Now let me turn to FedWorld force dispositions.” Fleet Admiral Jorge cued the next holovid slide, this one speckled with red icons marking the estimated positions of every Fed warship identified by Hammer intelligence and endless reconnaissance missions.

“In general, what we can see is the same trend we have observed for some time,” Jorge continued. “Apart from ships tasked with operations against our home planets, the Feds have been progressively building up the forces around their Fleet base at Comdur. Here.” He stabbed a marker down into a thick mass of red icons 10 or so light-years galactic west of Terranova.

“We now know for certain that these are the forces assigned for the invasion. We do not know which planet they have selected as their primary target, but our assessment is that it is almost certain to be Commitment.”

A small shiver ran through the men around the Defense Council table. The consequences of a successful Fed invasion of Commitment did not bear thinking about.

“Now, in addition-”

“Forgive me, Admiral,” interrupted Tobias de Mel, councillor for internal security.

“Sir?”

“How can we be sure that planetary invasion is what these ships are for?”

“Well, sir,” Admiral Jorge replied, “in part, it’s because of the nature of the forces assembled. The last reconnaissance drone fly-by of Comdur positively identified the planetary assault vessels Cheng Ho, Jefferson, Al-Fayed, Adams, and Yamamato. We also have unconfirmed intelligence reports that the planetary assault vessels Shrivaratnam, Nelson, Washington, Tourville, and Monroe have been tasked to Comdur, though we don’t yet know when they will drop in-system. All told, we estimate these ships have close to 400,000 marines embarked.”

“Kraa!” de Mel hissed. “That’s one hell of a lot of marines. Are we sure we can stop this, Admiral?”

That is a damn good question, Jorge thought. “Absolutely, Councillor,” he replied, his voice emphatic, confident. “When we launch Operation Damascus, all the ships tasked with the invasion will be in orbit around Comdur. When we have finished with them, the Feds will have barely enough warships left to protect their home planets. They will not have the ships they need to conduct offensive operations. They will also have suffered massive losses of experienced spacers and marines. So yes, I am sure we can stop this,” he said flatly, even though it was a lie. Anyone who believed that there was any such thing as an absolute certainty when it came to space warfare was a fool. These were politicians, and in Jorge’s book at least, that automatically made them fools when it came to all matters military.

“Now, in addition to the planetary assault vessels, the latest reconnaissance fly-by shows the bulk of the Fed fleet’s heavy units in orbit at Comdur station. We have also. .”

Thursday, March 30, 2400, UD

FWSS Eridani, pinchspace

Heart pounding, Michael waited for Eridani to drop.

Behind a closed visor, his face was slick with a thin, cold sweat. In two days it would be April Fools’ Day, which felt uncomfortably appropriate. Here was the ship of fools about to drop right into the Hammer’s lap. If Eridani and her crew got out safely, they would be right back to do it all over again. Michael could not help but feel they were pushing their luck.

Eight hours earlier, Task Group 300.1, under the command of Commodore Perkins in Damishqui, had dropped well out from the planet Faith. Undetected by the Hammer, the task group had laboriously assembled a comprehensive threat plot, data pouring in by the terabyte from both ship sensors and a far-flung constellation of surveillance drones orbiting on the fringes of Hammer farspace. Eventually, Commodore Perkins had pronounced himself satisfied that things were as they should be. Now the task group was on its way in to attack.

What a way to make a FedMark, Michael thought as he watched the seconds run off the drop timer with glacial slowness.

At last Eridani dropped, and the shit hit the fan.

The urgent sound of the threat proximity alarm told Eridani that things had changed significantly in the short time it had taken the task group to microjump out-system, reverse vector, and microjump back.

“This doesn’t sound good, team. So let’s do it properly.” Lenski cut off the alarm. “Sensors, don’t rush it. I don’t want us going off half-cocked.”

“On it, sir,” Michael replied, grateful for Lenski’s reassuring calm. He watched his sensors team working feverishly to distill the threat out of the chaotic mass of blood-red vectors spattered across the threat plot. His eyes tightened in disbelief as the cause of the proximity alarm became all too obvious. “Jeez,” he said out loud. The operation was falling apart, and they had been in Hammer space for what? Five seconds? The threat plot was a terrifying sight. Where there should have been nothing but empty space, there were thirty Hammer ships-ten of them heavy cruisers-all frighteningly close and all sitting across the task group’s attack vector. Where in God’s name had they come from? Stop dreaming, Michael, he chided himself. You have a job to do, so call the plot.

“Command, sensors. Threat plot is confirmed.”

“Command, roger.”