“Shadow Warrior, the human fleet is moving. Their small courier vessels returned to their home ships. The two escort ships on the port side of the fleet are bounding past one another, scanning into the asteroid field. They lack discipline, Shadow Warrior. See how their shields extend into the asteroid field and disturb the asteroids. My Pride Mother could track their movements.”
“Move us closer. The clutter from their disturbance of the asteroid field will confuse their sensors and cover our movement. Let us see how close we can get. Monitor them closely. Tell me when you even think they have detected us. Have your recorders operating at maximum efficiency. We must glean as much information as possible during this opportunity. What we are doing will be dangerous, but with danger comes high glory. Long live the Empire!”
“Long live the Empire!”
Angie and Kelly had extended their sensor probes out until they rested against each other’s ship. This gave them a rudimentary and un-interceptable communications means. Their sensors picked up the vibrations of each other’s voices and translated it into speech.
“Have you detected anything, Kelly?”
“No. I have all the ship’s passive sensors scanning as far as possible, but nothing yet. Wanda, do you detect anything?”
“No Kelly, I detect no sign of the K’Rang ship. I will inform you the second I do.”
An hour passed by and then six more. Kelly’s back itched in a spot that he could not reach. The blackness of space hung before him punctuated by only a few far stars. Kelly rubbed his back against the seat trying to scratch his itch.
“Say, Angie, can you come over here and scratch my back? There is a spot right between my shoulder blades that itches like crazy.”
“Yeah, hang on, I’ll be right over.”
Wanda broke in. “Kelly, perhaps I can help.”
“Yeah, right, I wish.”
“No, I can help. Lean forward a little.”
As Kelly leaned forward he could hear the seat adjust behind him.
“Lean back, Kelly, and rub against the seat.”
Kelly leaned back and found a bump in the seat right between his shoulder blades. The relief was instantaneous and felt wonderful.
“Thank you, Wanda, that feels great. You can return the seat to normal now.”
“You are welco… Kelly, we have company. I am detecting something blocking stars directly in front of us. It is moving very slowly. I do not have enough of a sensor lock to be able to tell you anything about it, but it is out there, dead ahead.”
“Angie, did you hear that?”
“I heard it. I don’t see anything yet. Try not to lose contact with it.”
“I see it. At least, I see where it was. I just had a star blink on and one blink off. I’m adding all that I have into the targeting computer. Once we fire up, I'll transmit it to you.”
“I think I see it, too. I can’t get a sensor lock, either. I get the impression it is only a few hundred kilometers out from us, but that is just a guess.”
Angie and Kelly spent another hour waiting. Their sensor picture of the K’Rang ship slowly fleshed out. Each additional detection of its movement added a bit more information. After another hour, they had enough information to determine that it was one of the smaller scout ships and not one of the larger and better-armed ships. After yet another hour, the scout had passed out of sight of their sensor and about 20 thousand kilometers past their current position. To maintain their contact, they would have to move out from the pocket on the asteroid. If they used only their retro thrusters, chances were good that the scout would not detect them.
“Shadow Warrior, we are approaching 175,000 kilometers from the frontier. We are within 80,000 kilometers of the human fleet. I have no indication that we have been detected. The asteroid debris from their gunnery exercise is obscuring my sensors somewhat. I have set maximum sensitivity to our forward sensors. The data I am collecting is of very high quality. I am detecting pulse cannons, energy beams, and particle cannons. We have suspected the humans had developed and fielded particle cannons, but this is the first confirmation of that. We have done well, Shadow Warrior; we should retreat behind the frontier now.”
“Shadow Technician, I wish to record some of their tactics as well. Can you see how their battle cruisers form a shield on the enemy side of the carrier? Do you see the way the large escort ships use their pulse cannon turrets to destroy the bits of asteroid coming at the fleet from the field? Look there. One of the small escorts is using a tractor beam to pick out asteroids and hurl them into the fleet. Even their supply ships have pulse turrets. We must get closer to gain as much of this data as possible.”
“Shadow Warrior, this data will do us no good if the enemy discovers our presence. This type of information is only useful if the enemy does not know we possess it. I urge you to turn back.”
K'Tella's ears pointing straight forward and his pupils wide open, he responded, “No, I am moving us forward. Concentrate on gathering information on their tractor beams. Our designers may be able to use this data to make our ships stronger.”
Kelly did not want to take a chance of alerting the K’Rang ship, but he and Angie couldn’t stay where they were and still monitor the scout ship’s movement. He came up with an idea.
“Angie, I think I know how we can change our view point without tipping our hand to the K’Rang. They put those extensions on our engine exhaust cones. If I push my ship back against the asteroid using my retro jets, I think I can move the rock. It won’t be much, but I should be able to move us a few degrees. I need you to monitor for when we get the K’Rang ship back in our sensor field.”
“Okay, but take it real slow. They may notice something as large as this rock if you move us too fast.”
“I’ll take it real slow. Now watch for when they come back into view.”
Kelly slowly applied his front thrusters until he felt the ship touch the rock. He nudged back further until all three exhaust cones were firmly pressed against the back of the indention. He slowly fired a sequence of short retro thrusts to try and determine the feel of the rock and the minimum thrust necessary to slowly spin the rock. After a few minutes he thought he had a feel for it and applied a long burst and stopped. The rock moved ever so slightly. A few more bursts and he had the rock slowly moving in the direction he needed. He let the rock spin and then told Angie, “I need you to back up and do the same as I just did to stop us when we get lined up.”
“I’ll try. I’m not as comfortable with banging up my ship as you are with yours.”
Angie backed her ship against the rock and emulated Kelly’s retro thrusts. The rock slowed.
“Don’t push too hard. We need another ten degrees to be facing right at them. I just have them at the edge of my sensors.”
“Say when,” she said as she hit the thrusters again.
“When. Don’t over correct.”
Angie gave a couple of thruster bursts and the rock slowed to a stop.
“How’s that?”
“Great view. I think if we give them another hour, we have them.”
“Shadow Warrior, we are at 190,000 km from the frontier. We are 20,000 km from the fleet. I have collected a great deal of data on their tractor beam. Once again, I recommend we retire and deliver our information to our forces.”
Reluctantly, the Shadow Warrior conceded his point. “Agreed, Shadow Technician, I will hold here. Prepare the data for transmission.”
“Kelly,” Wanda announced, “the scout ship has stopped moving. I am detecting some sort of turret rising up from the hull of the scout ship. It appears to be swiveling toward our position.”
“What? Do you get any indication of a weapon charging up?”
