Cyborg Assault

Stung, Marten asked, “Are you referring to Osadar?”

“You must self-destruct our Zenos,” Rhea told Yakov. “You must show the Confederation that we are still loyal guardians.”

“Make a run for Ganymede,” Marten suggested.

Several minutes ago, turmoil had struck as a message from Athena Station arrived. It had shocked Yakov, who had informed Marten it was the Secessionist code. From incoming radio messages, it was clear that several warships with crewmembers from Ganymede, Europa and Io had received similar instructions.

Yakov studied Rhea’s screen. “The two meteor-ships have fired Zenos at us. The Secessionist broadcast came from Athena Station. None of this makes sense.”

“Yes it does,” Rhea said. “Arbiters broke the Secessionist plot. They have now broadcast the go message to see which crews are loyal to the Confederation. Since Athena Station believes we’re in rebellion, they have ordered our destruction.”

“That’s madness,” Yakov said. “They wouldn’t order our ship’s destruction, but arrest us later in port.”

“Forget about that,” Marten said. “You must run for Ganymede as you alert everyone about the cyborgs.”

Yakov was shaking his head. “Are those two ships Guardian Fleet vessels or do they contain cyborgs like the Rousseau?”

“Once they launch drones at you,” Marten said, “what difference does it make?”

“You speak from barbarian emotionalism,” Rhea murmured.

Yakov scowled. “Do you realize what the broadcast means? Secessionist crewmembers are likely even now slaughtering arbiters and ship-controllers as they take over several warships. The philosophers of Callisto will never forgive us for that.”

“Launch Zenos at the two meteor-ships and run for Ganymede,” Marten said. “Anything else is suicide.”

“Do not listen to the barbarian,” Rhea pleaded. “We must make peace. We must surrender.”

Yakov rubbed bloodshot eyes before he floated to his command chair. From there, he began to issue orders.

In moments, the Descartes rotated toward Jupiter and applied thrust. It headed into the gas giant’s gravity-well. It used the planet’s pull to help build velocity. Ganymede was on the other side of Jupiter, making it many days away from their present location.

* * *

On the Rousseau’s emergency bridge, CR37 continued his attempts to foil the enemy.

The Highborn laser fired with uncanny accuracy, at times burning exposed point-defense cannons. Sometimes, it melted through the hull behind the cannons.

“Rotate the ship three degrees,” CR37 said.

The laser from the hard-braking Highborn ship chewed into asteroid rock as the dreadnaught rotated just enough to throw off their aim. The laser melted rock then, creating gas, liquid and slagging off boulder pieces. It other words, the laser proved ineffective against too much mass and density, that of simple interstellar rock.

“Enemy Zenos have achieved lock-on,” the unmodified woman whispered. Her hands trembled as tears ran down her soft cheeks. Some of the tears floated around her face.

CR37’s fingers blurred across his controls. He attempted electronic countermeasures, spewed chaff and prismatic crystals. He used everything to try to deflect the huge drones from his warship. Lastly, he turned his ship, aligning the final point-defense cannons with the Zenos’ approach path.

* * *

The two Zenos increased speed as their chemical fuel burned fast.

Then one of the Rousseau’s depleted uranium pellets struck the first drone’s hull. It almost caused the drone to veer off-target, but internal guidance redirected it at the nearing dreadnaught.

Then another pellet struck.

Internal computing calculated the odds of hitting the target. The odds had dropped below the required number. The Zeno’s primary function ceased and the secondary level attack commenced.

Rods sprouted into position, each aimed at vulnerable points on the dreadnaught. The Zeno warhead exploded with thermonuclear devastation. As the explosion obliterated the drone, x-rays and gamma rays used the aimed rods, traveling along them. Before the explosion destroyed the rods, they had concentrated the deadly radiation against the dreadnaught. That radiation stabbed like a spear instead of simply expanding and dissipating in a nuclear fireball.

Those x-rays and gamma rays hit the Rousseau with ugly power. The unmodified woman sitting beside CR37 died instantly. The cyborg’s brainpan lacked enough shielding to protect him, and he died several seconds later. The x-rays also melted several critical fuses. At that point, all but one point-defense cannon fell silent. That cannon now lacked proper targeting data.

The second Zeno zoomed at the Rousseau. It closed to five hundred kilometers, four hundred, three hundred, two, one hundred kilometers and then sped into the ship. The thermonuclear device ignited with obliterating power.

While particle shielding protected much, it failed to protect enough. Every living thing in and around the Rousseau died. And vast quantities of mass hurtled outward from the terrific explosion.

-21-

The Descartes accelerated down the mighty gravity-well of Jupiter.

Gravity-well was a term, useful in any system with a planetary body. The Sun, Earth and Jupiter each had a gravity-well. The Galilean moons of Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto also had gravity- wells. Jupiter had the biggest gravity-well after the Sun. The meaning was simple. Jupiter pulled things toward it because of its massive size, because of the gravitational attractive force it had on other masses such as people, ships, moons and passing comets. To escape Jupiter, to leave it, one needed a certain velocity—the escape velocity. If a ship failed to reach the escape velocity, it would orbit Jupiter, unable to leave.

In this instance, Jupiter was at the bottom of the well. To fire a rocket out of the well took more power than it would to shoot a rocket down toward Jupiter.

This was simple, gravitational mechanics, and it had consequences in space combat. The common misconception was that space lacked terrain other than planets and asteroids, comets and moons. But that was false. There was gravity, among other factors such as radiation, solar wind, the ecliptic of the planets and such. A ship high in the gravity-well had high ground just as an archer on a hill shooting down had an advantage over an archer shooting up the hill.

In the Jupiter System, this was even more the case than in the Mars System.

This was one of the reasons why Athena Station had been chosen as the Guardian Fleet Headquarters. It had the high ground in comparison to the four Galilean moons, which were closer to Jupiter and thus deeper in the well.

Marten sat in his module, enduring the acceleration and observing the others. He would trade places with Omi soon and get some sleep.

“Yes,” Yakov said. He watched the main screen and witnessed the Rousseau’s death.

“You really did it,” Rhea said, her eyes wide with shock. “You destroyed a Guardian Fleet warship.”

Marten switched to the same visual. It was a long teleoptic shot of the obliterated Rousseau, visible now because it no longer hid behind a gel-cloud.