“Don’t do anything stupid now, I would like to see you come back,” she said with a smile.
“No problem, I have absolutely no intention of letting some religious crazy get in my way, you just watch yourself. We have unfinished business!” he said as he swung himself out of the room and into the corridor.
It didn’t take long and they were soon moving down the main corridor where scores of other marines were collecting their gear and boarding their craft. Marcus and Jesus along with another eight marines were waiting in a group at the far right, separate to the rest of them. Spartan and Teresa moved over. Most of them were wearing their full PDS gear and the rest were in the process of fitting on their armour and checking their weapons for the hundredth time.
“We’re supposed to wait here for Colonel West. He’s leading the commando operation. You ever met the guy?” asked Marcus.
“Nope, never heard of him,” answered Teresa.
“You have now,” said a short, scrawny looking man who appeared behind Spartan.
The man stood with a group of a dozen similar looking men and one woman. Though they wore normal Personal Defence Suits, they had a slightly different camouflage pattern to the rest of the marines and their equipment was certainly older and well used. The officer stepped forward and shook each of their hands.
“This is my team, I take it you’ve gone over the mission briefing. Normally we wouldn’t take newbies on a first mission but our numbers are small and we need every man we can get. We will go in first, you’ll provide backup and a tactical reserve. This doesn’t mean you’ll be sitting back in the shuttles, you are just as important as the rest of the unit. Stay together and keep an eye on the guy next to you.” He looked around the group of fresh marines.
The tannoy system blared loudly across the ship.
“All units to your posts, we are loading the shuttles. I repeat, all to their station, it is not a drill!” came the order and it was repeated over and over.
“Let’s go!” The Colonel shouted as his team moved down the shaft and towards the waiting shuttles.
As they moved off Spartan lifted his hand and smacked his hand onto Teresa’s outstretched palm.
“Good luck!” she said.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Though not the most famous, the CCS Invincible was a ship with a history that was unique to any other vessel in the Fleet. During the Great War she was the last battleship to engage another battleship in open battle. Most engagements were fought by carriers and cruisers, but by a chance encounter she had run into the rebel warship, the Redoubtable. This battle between two equals has been studied for generations, as to the power and the futility of putting two such behemoths against each other. After more than twenty hours of continuous battle and over twelve thousand casualties there was still no victor. Both vessels were quickly disabled and unable to leave the area and neither captain would surrender his vessel. It wasn’t until the arrival of the fourteen ships of the Kerberos Squadron that the battle could be decided. Five of those ships were also lost until the Redoubtable was finally destroyed.
The shattered but still operational hulk of the CCS Invincible and the remnants of the Kerberos Squadron were present at the signing of the armistice. The old ship is a relic of the Great War and is still moored at the Fleet Headquarters in Alpha Centauri. A visit to the ship is part of the required training for all naval cadets.
Ships of the Interstellar Navy
In the Combat Information Centre of the CCS Crusader it was decision time and the Admiral and her staff were getting nervous. As every minute passed the chances of a decisive and relatively bloodless conclusion slipped away. From inside the bustling room a dozen officers moved back and forth, updating the tactical display and co- ordinating actions between the numerous ships involved in the battle. Hundreds of officers both on the ground and aboard the myriad of vessels involved in the operation did their best to keep everything moving smoothly.
The ground assault on the smaller manmade stations had now been raging for over two hours and there were no signs that the rest of the transit stations would be falling anytime soon. Though much smaller than the massive Titan Naval Station, each was the home to hundreds or thousands of people and couldn’t be simply destroyed from orbit. The stations circled the planet of Prime at different altitudes with the most remote being hundreds of kilometres from the planet. They offered a variety of landing platforms, refineries, ports and shipyards for Prime. Though Titan Naval Station was massive, most of the inhabited areas were situated on the nearside of the moon that faced Prime. The bulk of the population was clustered around the civilian port and naval yard.
As expected, resistance had been heavy but the arrival of volunteer fighters from the planet had not been spotted. On several of the stations there were hundreds of additional fighters and though their skills were limited, they were easily able to hold off and keep the attacking marines busy. These last minute volunteers showed no regard for human life and they were happy to be used as human bombs or simply to draw the marines’ fire to expose their positions to the more experienced Zealot fighters. The latest reports put the attacking marines’ casualties now at over a hundred and as each minute went by more figures came in. The only black mark so far was that one shuttle with eighty-two civilians and twelve marines had been lost due to a suicide bomber making her way inside. The craft had almost reached the transport when her vest detonated. At least the shuttle hadn’t made it inside the transport or it could have easily caused many more casualties. The one piece of good news was that over eight hundred civilians had been rescued by the operations on the smaller Titan stations and were already being shipped by shuttlecraft to the waiting ships. It was bloody work but they appeared to be making progress.
Of even more of a serious concern to the Admiral, was that the cruiser wing had just moved into range of the Naval Station. This was a risky gambit as the battleship had lots of options available and the last thing she wanted was to have to slug it out with an almost impregnable vessel right next to the Station. If they could get her to move the assault would have been pulled off. She prayed the defenders would take the bait. On the tactical screen she watched the line of three cruisers moving in formation to the Station. The three cruisers were powerful ships and easily capable of taking on several similar sized vessels or even one of the stations on their own. A ship like the Victorious however was another matter. The only people capable of producing a vessel of that size and power were the shipyards and engineers of the Confederation Navy. She didn’t enjoy the irony of having to face a ship that had been built and designed to be almost impregnable for the very people that would now have to attack it.
“Captain Matthias, give me a sitrep,” she ordered.
“Affirmative, Admiral. We are twelve kilometres from the Station and so far have been ignored. There is massive electronic and radar jamming in the area and we are having a hard time scanning for power signatures and weapons. We can see their disposition though and it looked like we might be in luck,” he said.
General Rivers moved closer, examining the tactical display and then looked back at the Admiral.
“I don’t like it,” he said.
“Understood, Captain, take your ships in, just don’t get too close that you can’t leave. We are twelve minutes behind you. Good luck,” she added.
“Thank you, Admiral, out,” he said and the intercom went silent.
On the deck of the cruiser CCS Achilles, Captain Matthias watched the massive Titan Naval Station through the glass. At first glance it looked just like a moon, but on closer examination the huge jetties, gantries and cranes could be found on almost every section of the surface. Around the orbit of the moon were large numbers of ships though most were small freighters and transports. What he was more interested in were the two warships the heavy cruiser CCS Resolution and the battleship CCS Victorious. The first ship was still venting gasses. It looked like it had sustained heavy damage. Victorious however appeared completely unscathed.
“Engineering, I need everything you have on the warships, stat!” he shouted to the three officers on his right. The men were sitting in front of a large display that presented masses of data on both the cruiser wing and the enemy vessels.
