I think that’s what will bother Larry the most. Not being injured, but missing out on a real mission. I can’t say I’m happy to be going into a real fight without the best man in my flight, either. This has to be real—there’s no way they’d pull everyone off base this fast right after training if it wasn’t for real. I wonder who we’ll be up against.
Are Terran ships harassing shipping again, claiming that all colonies still belong to the mother planet? Has Venus finally been caught shipping some biological horror across space or unleashed something? Do we have another incident with Martian terrorists in their endless, bloody civil war? Or is it Saturn? Is this it—are the two biggest powers in the solar system finally throwing down in a war that could end everything? There’s no way to tell and no time to worry about it now.
Finally, we all get to the hanger. The Carrier Aero-Space Transport (or CAST) is a short, fat, rounded hull with stubby wings in front of a massive, multi-function engine. These tubby little shuttles are custom made to carry passengers and cargo to carriers, and this one will be our ride up. The ramp is down, and it’s organized chaos as everyone loads aboard. We get into the spartan cargo bay and strap into the padded acceleration couches.
Once the last of us is aboard, I do a quick check to make sure we’re all here. A query with my cyber-augments tells me our exo-frames are already loaded aboard another shuttle on the way to the carrier. Looks like we’ve got everything we need. I confirm we’re all here to the pilot, and the ramp comes up, and the hatch seals. Outside, I can hear the atmosphere being evacuated before we’re launched. Everyone who hasn’t already done so now seals their helmets to their uniforms, and we check each other’s seals on our suits. Even routine space flight is still space flight.
The ship vibrates and hums as the engines power up. The magnetic launch rails of the station hum to life. We brace as the hanger hatches open and let in the roaring hydrogen hurricane of Jupiter as we’re launched out into the storm clouds.
* * *
The fusion powered ramjets on the CAST roar to life and push us all back into the cushioning. At 6 Gs, nothing feels soft, and my spine tries to push up through my sternum. Still, it’s a pleasant ride compared to a combat launch from a carrier. The craft shudders as it breaks through the sound barrier, and then we’re pushed down even further into the padding as the CAST tilts and rockets upward toward space. In a few minutes, the roar of atmosphere dies away, and the ship’s torch drive roars to life. Now the weight pours on again as the transport fights against the strongest planetary well in the solar system aside from the Sun itself.
I double check the flight plan with my cyber-augments. Yeah, the carrier had already left the station about the time we got the call to embark and is now burning along at a steady 3 Gs. Catch up, or get left behind, everyone. So our CAST and a small fleet of similar craft are all blasting along at around 6 Gs to catch up.
This isn’t how we usually board a carrier, of course. Usually, we take a regular shuttle up and transfer aboard like normal people going to a space station or a ship in orbit. This rushed maneuver we’re doing is expensive, wasteful, and potentially dangerous. Which is why it’s usually done only in an emergency.
Still, we’ve all trained for this scenario. Most of those scenarios involved a full-scale war with an enemy that used tactics and equipment remarkably similar to the Saturnine Union. We’ve never said we’re training for war with Saturn directly, of course. Relations between the planets are great today. So great, actually, that we’re scrambling into space was fast as we can to board a warship that’s already underway.
While I was racing to get my team aboard, I had no time for worry. Now, as the flight wears on, the worries surface. Why are we launching? What’ll we be facing? What are our odds? Are we really ready? No one has anything to say. Whatever my superiors know, they’re probably too busy to tell us yet.
The camera view from outside shows the curving horizon of Jupiter visibly receding behind us. Space around us is the usual cluster of stations, moons, and satellites, along with the moving constellations of blue stars of torch ships underway. One of the clusters of blue stars is our carrier task force group.
The carrier Admiral Marshall Weston isn’t traveling alone, of course. The two Nike-class cruisers are escorts, along with four destroyers, two scout ships, two stealth fast attack ships (hidden out there somewhere), and a supply ship. There’s the Marine transport Willis McGregor with us, too. It’s basically a little carrier stuffed with Marines, transports, and gunships. So it looks like there are going to be boarding actions or maybe some action around the asteroid colonies. The medical ship coming along hopefully won’t be necessary, but it’s reassuring to see that we’ve got one. The lack of space artillery or mobile repair stations tells me we’ll be moving fast and unable to bring slow platforms that can’t keep up. I guess if we get bogged down somewhere, they can send them later.
Finally, we catch up to the carrier. She’s not rotating at the moment—most big ships don’t when they’re under maneuvers. Not only does it make maneuvering easier for the carrier, it makes it a lot easier for our CASTs to approach and dock. Through the external cameras, I can see our CAST pull up next to
