“Arik?” Asked Derrick as they fell. He could hear the shields beginning to whine as the alien energy weapons continued to land squarely on the bow of the shields. The majority of the shots were actually aimed at the forward section of the ship, where a human would have been firing at the more important engine sections. Derrick had no idea why this was the case but he was grateful for it at the moment.
“We are nearly at maximum capacity heat tolerance even with the modified protocols in place. Those energy weapons are creating far more heat than was expected.” She grumbled
“And that was with some significant fudging of the numbers. Captain, we just lost shields!” said Derrick.
The Canada vibrated as several impacts from the energy weapons hit the hull.
“The hull is holding though?” asked Stagg.
Arik brought up a schematic of the Canada on the forward monitor, showing the current hull stresses.
“We’re not smooth sailing, but we’re holding. Armor layers are being striped at a rate that so long as no more intensive fire were used we could remain operational for another hour. However that is only the hull integrity. At current rate of fire the crew will be dead in ten minutes due to overheating.”
“Lovely. When do we need to execute the atmospheric heat dispersal?” asked Stagg.
The ship shook and Derrick winced, “Right when we’re passing between the two of them.”
“Everyone strapped in?” asked Arik sounding jovial at the prospect.
“How violent is this little maneuver going to be?” asked Stagg as she snapped the g-restraints over herself.
“Violent, we’re not supposed to vent atmosphere like this. It’s going to be more like a hull breach than a normal combat depressurization.”
Stagg hit the ship wide comm. “All personnel, into restraints, prepare for combat conditions. We will be venting the ships atmosphere in an unorthodox manner, brace!” she shouted.
The Canada was almost between the two Empire ships now, they were still firing albeit slightly more hesitantly now. If this was because they had never encountered a ship that could survive their onslaught without shields or they simply could not charge their weapons quickly enough no one on the Canada knew.
Derrick took a calming breath and opening his eyes looked down at the main ship display. Arik silently brought up the program and queued it for deployment.
“Ten seconds.” Said Arik.
The heat dispersal systems of the ship returned to their default settings, and began to sink the excess energy into the radiative portions of the hull. The outer airlock doors for personnel on either side of the ship opened in preparation.
The Canada was now almost between the two Imperial ships. They had ceased firing with what appeared to be their main weapons and had switched to smaller variants. No doubt to avoid hitting one another as the ship moved between them.
Warnings flashed up on almost every monitor on the bridge, the computer did not like that the airlocks were both open and someone was readying to open the inner doors. Arik casually squashed the warnings after a moment and silenced the alarms.
“Everyone hold on!” said Derrick, and he started the heat dispersal program.
The internal temperature of the ship was close to 150 degrees, and that was the tolerance for most of the internal systems. It was time to air out and rid themselves of the excess energy. The inner airlock doors snapped open more violently than they ever had before, Arik overriding the actuators inside of the mechanisms.
The air inside of the Canada evacuated into space, dragging with it small objects and other effects that had not been properly sealed. Those compartments of the ship housing crew more slowly bled off their atmosphere lest an unwitting crewmember be pulled out into space.
The oxygen and nitrogen along with smaller amounts of carbon dioxide was violently blown outwards directly into the paths of the incoming weapon fire, in the vacuum of space it did little, but the ignition spark traveled inwards. Both airlocks, where the concentration of the escaping atmosphere was densest caught fire for a brief moment, flames seeming to reach up out of the hull of the ship before quickly consuming what remained of the oxygen they died out doing little to the ship.
The Crews of the imperial ships now sure the crew of the odd ship were dead ceased fire for several moments, the residual heat of the internal structure still superheated masked the crew of the Canada for several moments before everything started to cool.
The entire ship rattled and heaved as the last of the atmosphere left, carrying with it the damaging heat. A slight difference between the two airlocks introduced a torque and set the Canada spinning.
Slowly at first but with increasing speed the Canada began to emulate a child’s top. The acceleration forces were barely felt in the center of the ship where the bridge was, although Derrick felt his stomach beginning to rebel as his sense of balance was thrown for a loop. He had taken g training like everyone else, but then the acceleration felt here was unlike anything in that course.
“1 g of acceleration on our bow and stern.” Reported Arik.
“We’re going to have to kill this rotation before we hit the atmosphere!” said the pilot.
“The enemy ships have stopped firing!” said the man at tactical.
“Probably looks like they’ve scored a direct hit and we’re now venting.” Said Stagg.
“We’re going to encounter the atmosphere in about thirty seconds.”
“The lead vessel is sending out a message asking if we would like assistance to avoid hitting the atmosphere.” Said Arik.
Stagg grimaced, “No response.” She paused for a moment thinking, “Arik do you know the Empire’s emergency transmissions band? The general distress signal?”
“Ma’am?” asked Arik.
“Yes or no?”
“Yes, it was a part of the basic information inside the alien fighter craft. We’ve had the general distress format for nearly a decade. Why?”
“The shield technology they use, it doesn’t work in an atmosphere correct?” asked Stagg turning to Derrick changing the subject.
The Engineer blinked, “No, it burns too much energy since it absorbs and redirects anything in contact with it. An atmosphere is too much to sustain over a long period of time. You could do it, but it’s not practical.”
“So if they were to join us in the atmosphere, they would not have shields raised?”
“I wouldn’t think so, how are you going to get them to follow us into the atmosphere though?” asked Derrick curious what she had planned now.
“Good, Arik on my order I want to start transmitting that general distress call.”
The bridge was silent for a moment as everyone absorbed the order, and the intention behind it.
“We’re signaling a false surrender?” asked Arik channeling the general apprehensiveness of everyone else on the bridge.
Stagg grimaced, “We are.”
Everyone on the bridge glanced at one another. In Earth history, for nearly half a millennium now the signaling of a false surrender was a war crime, one that both Mars and Earth had punished Captains for during the war when they had been foolish enough to employ the tactic.
Like the boy calling wolf, no one wanted to be ignored when they were actually in distress.
“Ma’am,” said Derrick turning in his seat slightly to look at her.
“I gave the order, we can debate the legality of it later,” growled Stagg. She glared at Derrick for a moment as if daring him to raise an objection. He looked at her for a moment, but slowly turned back to his console.
“Should I note this in the log?” asked Arik her voice somewhat muted.
“Yes, you’re to make no attempt to falsify the logs afterwards either. No one is to attempt to mislead any investigation into this. I am ordering you to signal a false surrender. Now carry out that order.”
The bridge was silent for several long moments. The air was now completely evacuated from the section and with it all of the excess heat as well as the sound. The only noises were now through the helmet earpieces and ship communication channels.
“We are in the atmosphere.” Reported the pilot, “So far our trajectory looks good, we are in a controlled decent.”
“We should be through the worst of the ablation in two minutes,” said Derrick as he glanced back at the atmospheric characteristics. Their current trajectory had them more dipping in an out of the atmosphere. It would take only minimal thrust to return them to an orbit.
“That is when we will be able to fire?” asked Stagg.
“Yes.”
“I can keep us at that altitude for three minutes before we’ll have lost too much velocity to climb back up out of the atmosphere.” Said the pilot.
“Will we be able to perform an FTL jump if we surpass that time?” asked Stagg.
Derrick winced but nodded in affirmation, “That wouldn’t be on my list of recommendations. We could do it but the repairs afterwards will be extensive. At least a month without a dry dock. So I would say no unless we’re about to die.” Said Derrick.
“Understood.”
The bridge fell silent again and Derrick closed the outer airlock doors. The Canada was now in the upper limits of the atmosphere of the planet and needed to utilize her aerodynamic profile. Which was little more than a flying brick. Still, she was designed to handle an Earth like atmosphere. This was technically a good idea even if its implementation was insane.
“Outer hull is at 1500 degrees and rising.”
The crew was silent as the ship slowly at first began to vibrate, and then buck beneath them. The control systems kept them pointed accurately on the entry corridor.
“Outer hull is at 2000 degrees and rising.”
Derrick was the only member of the bridge not alternating between looking at the rapidly climbing temperature or the enemy ships behind them. Instead he was preparing to open all compartments and open all of the radiator vents to allow the ultra-cool atmosphere to flood into the combat critical components of the vessel.
“Outer hull is at 3100 degrees and holding.” Reported Arik.
The Derrick could feel the vibration from the entry in his skull and teeth now, it was working its way into his thoughts and seemed to be discouraging anything besides the most basic thoughts.
“The outer hull temperature is falling, 2800 degrees, and continuing to plummet!” Said Arik excitedly.
There was defiantly going to be heat damage and other effects due to the wild temperatures fluxes but it was still going to work. Derrick knew that much.
“I’m opening all vent’s and radiator components Gunnery crews as soon as you are in temperature tolerances power up your capacitors, not beforehand!” said Derrick.
A chorus of affirmations went through his channel.
“Begin to transmit the distress call.” Ordered Stagg.
“The beacon signal for surrender has been set to repeat.” Said Arik after a moment.
“Any response?” asked Stagg.
“They are responding with affirmations of a willingness to help. They are asking if we need to be towed out of the atmosphere.”
Derrick frowned at that wondering how they intended to influence the trajectory of something as massive as the Canada inside an atmosphere without sheering it apart.
“Respond affirmative.”
“The message has been sent. They are moving to intercept us after maximum aerodynamic pressure has passed.”
“Any details on how they plan to help?” asked Derrick.
“They are sending instructions for docking and landing bay protocols, so I would assume we are supposed to use our escape pods.” Said Arik somewhat coolly.
“Damn, here I was hoping they would have some magical beam to pull us out.”
Stagg ignored the two of them and instead watched the outer hull temperatures continue to fall, passing from the dangerous levels down towards nominal.
“Derrick, we can fire now?” she asked.
Derrick glanced down at his monitor, “Five seconds. Helm can start maneuvering us into the correct firing vector.”
“Got it,” said the pilot. The Canada slowly began to twist around in the air, she vibrated as the aerodynamic forces rippled across her hull and wormed into every crevice and crack in her armor. The air rushing past the radiative systems leached the heat away from them and for the first time in her service history the human ship was not limited by her ability to disperse heat, but rather by how quickly she could chamber the next round and fire.
The ship practically purred, as dangerous as this maneuver was it was like she had been unshackled and let loose upon the world. For the first time she need not care for the small creatures that crawled inside her, for the first time she could really fight!
“Target the nearest ship, all gunnery crews prepare to fire. Arik, I want you to hack into the other vessel, no need to be nice about it.”
“Yes Ma’am!” shouted the crew over the roar of the atmosphere around them.
Stagg paused for a moment her hand over the com panel.
“Damn it.” She muttered, it was barely picked up by the microphone but Derrick heard it.
She switched the emergency beacon off, the signal of false surrender and need for aid that had been transmitted died.
For a half second Stagg did nothing. If they ever made it back to Bellona she was most certainly going to be jailed. Her crew would survive though, that was the important thing.
“Fire!” shouted Stagg as she stood up from her chair. The gravity of the massive planet below them making the task difficult.
The main gun running the length of the ship, usually only reserved for stationary targets roared to life, with a violent electromagnetic explosion it fired. The rounds hastily modified by the gunnery deck to be bullet shaped for aerodynamic accuracy left the muzzle at just over 12,000 meters a second. Slow compared to the usual speed of the projectiles but inside an Earth like atmosphere something close to craft re-entry speeds.
Several layers of the round immediately ablated and burned away shedding with it kinetic energy as it arced through the atmosphere. By the time it struck it was little more than kinetic energy and energized molten metal. The rounds left a faint line in the air making it look like the Canada had fired one of the Empire’s energy weapons for a half moment.
The round struck the Imperial vessel and punched straight through it hardly slowing down as it passed through what was compared to the thick atmosphere almost empty space consisting of a single atmosphere of pressure and thin metal compartments. Before the crews of all three ships had even registered that the first round had hit the second had already gone through the vessel, punching another clean hole through the Empire craft.
The first round passed through nothing critical, and besides letting the atmosphere of the gas giant into the crew space did little in the way of damage. The human rounds were so fast, and the Empire ships so thin that that rounds which had been designed during the earth Mars to shatter on impact and transfer the maximum amount of kinetic energy were ineffective. The doctrine differences although giving humanity the upper hand did not guarantee success. Within moments smaller shield emitters had the holes in the hull patched.
The second round however struck an energy conduit and continued straight through it, and for a brief moment cut the energy going to one of the Empire ships stabilization systems.
The Imperial ship listed slightly to the side, and exposed the vulnerable bridge perched atop the hull of the vessel to the Canada’s main gun.
Arik, moving faster than any of the human gunners could, relying mostly on the fully artificial parts of her brain the chemical reactions of what remained of her human brain to slow began lining the main gun up with the bridge as the first human gunners on the Canada opened fire.
She hesitated for only a moment, her human synapsis moved registering on an instinctive level what she was about to do. For a half moment she considered the lives, the lives of every person on the ship that would be ended with her ruthless elimination of the bridge.
They were the enemy though, part of the government that had stripped humanity of its home. Even if no one on that ship had knowledge of that attack, even if every man and woman on that ship were a saint it changed nothing.
They had attacked humanity, for that they would burn.
Arik finished adjusting the main gun of the ship, and fired.
A vicious feeling of glee lanced down what remained of her neocortex as she watched the bridge flash up in a gout of flame and molten metal.
The other ship had already raised it shields, despite the massive power drain it would incur within an atmosphere and began to rise up back towards orbit. It was sliding ahead of the Canada’s trajectory speeding back up far more quickly than a human ship would be able to do.
“All gunners target the escaping ship, Arik turn the main gun to fire as well when the other ship no longer has propulsion.”
“Yes sir!” Said Arik as the fifth round from the main gun slammed into the Imperial ship ripping through another of the energy management systems.
The ship stuttered, and then dropped like a stone pushed from a ledge. It still had some horizontal velocity but as compared to the Canada it seemed to simply stop and fall. There was no hope of landing, and no matter how advanced their shield technology might be it would not hold off the pressures of a failed star.
The matter that made up the vessel would be crushed and flattened by the massive pressures as it was carried through different bands and layers of the planet’s atmosphere. Perhaps some time in the distant future it would impact the small chunk of compressed rock and refuse that made up the core of the planet.
Small portions of the ship began to split away and fly up away from it arcing up into orbit.
“Escape pods,” said Arik almost lamely.
“Are they able to communicate with the beacon?” asked Stagg.
“Any messages they send will be picked up and retransmitted via FTL communications after the light speed delay. 5.6 hours at this distance. I cannot estimate on response times after that.”
“We’ll either be dead in the water for months or dead in six hours!” said Derrick from his console before Stagg could ask the question about destroying them.
“Don’t fire on the escape pods.” Said Stagg as she opened the Comm to the gunnery crews for a moment.
The Canada was laboriously beginning to turn towards the remaining enemy ship. Her engines were straining already to produce enough thrust to keep them from falling down into the atmosphere of the planet. The Imperial ship was landing hit after hit on the hull of the Canada, with each impact the vessel violently rattled and shook. She held though, like a boxer weathering hits in the ring she smiled up at her opponent asking if that was all they had.
“We’re holding at 80% of thermal limits.” Said Derrick.
“Arik what’s their engine status?” asked Stagg.
“They have suffered damage, there is a 2% chance they will be able to perform a jump within the next ten minutes.”
“Good, all guns cease fire. Arik, begin to charge the main capacitors to full. Helm pull us up out of the atmosphere, follow that ship!”
Derrick glanced over at the Captain.
“We’ve only theorized that we’d be able to break through their shields at full power. You want to risk the maneuver now?”
“They are the ones running now. We cannot remain in the atmosphere any longer. I want the Ace held in reserve in case this shot does not work.”
“I will only be able to hold the maximum charge for thirty seconds.” Warned Arik.
“That’s all the time we will need.” Said Stagg.
The Imperial ship was indeed on the run, its engines flaring as it broke orbit with the gas giant. The energy shots suddenly died off as it retreated.
“They are transmitting general distress and flying the white flag.” Said Arik as the Canada slowly continued to rise up through the atmosphere of the gas giant shuddering and shaking from side to side as she more slowly than the Imperial vessel ascended back into space.
“I fear we might have just taught them a new trick. Arik, inform them if they wish to surrender they need to abandon ship.”
Arik transmitted the message, The Canada breaking free of the atmosphere at last angled herself up towards the Imperial vessel and pushed her engines to the limit in an attempt to catch up.
“I have been informed that for him to abandon ship while it is still operating will not be possible. He is asking that we contact our commanding officer and come to an agreement.”
Stagg raised an eyebrow at that, “Contact our commanding officer, and hash out a deal?” she asked.
“I’m not sure what he means either.”
“Signal them to abandon ship again.”
“I have repeated the message thrice over now.”
Stagg sighed, “Very well then. Fire at will Arik, aim for the engines. I want them to hand data over if possible.”
Arik didn’t need to be told twice. Taking control of the ship from the pilot she carefully lined up the main gun of the ship and using all of the power stored in the capacitors fired. The round, no linger encumbered by an atmosphere shot towards the vessel with the full force of the magnetic acceleration rails available.
It slammed into the shields of the imperial vessel less than a quarter second later. A splash of plasma showed where it had hit, but otherwise did nothing to the enemy vessel.
“Damn it. I was hoping we might be able to punch through.” Grumbled Derrick.
Stagg let out a sigh, “We’ve got nothing close to the firepower of the Phobos gun, and that didn’t even bother a vessel that appeared to be older than this one.”
“Still, we’ve been working on improving the weapons for a decade. Some small amount of give would be appreciated.”
Stagg hummed in agreement, “Fire up the Ace.”
“Roger, powering up. Ten seconds until the field is viable.”
The Imperial vessel apparently realizing it had the advantage now, or at least thought it did had stopped retreating away and had cut its acceleration even as the Canada continued to move forwards.
“If we are to activate the Ace and sustain fire, I would recommend we do not fire the main gun again. Allow the smaller munitions which create less heat to fire? We have only one Ace device left.” Said Arik.
“Go ahead and power it down.”
The hum that had been permeating the background since the atmosphere had returned died away.
The Imperial ship was lighting up on the thermal scan’s they were preparing to fire again.
“Ace is up.” Said Derrick.
The Imperial ship paused, apparently realizing something was wrong. From what Derrick could tell the capacitors for their weapons were full.
“Fire.” Ordered Stagg.
The smaller guns along the hull of the Canada, all of those that could sight the enemy ship fired. Their round smaller, and traveling with less kinetic velocity produced less heat and almost did more immediate damage to the Imperial ship than the larger rounds had.
So small that they could not completely penetrate the multiple hulls of the ship, they transferred the entirety of their kinetic energy into the ship, and in some cases bounced off of the metal composition of it’s corridors injuring its crew.
The Imperial ship fired at them, the beams of energy bathed the front of the Canada in reddish light and energy. Once more the heat dispersal systems of the ship were overtaxed, sending many of the forward compartments into emergency fire suppression mode.
“Target critical marked components!” said Arik as she highlighted parts of the Imperial ship.
The gunnery crews expertly switched targets, focusing on the weak points.
Within moments Derrick saw the energy output of the ship drop, the main reactor no doubt having been hit.
“Their reactor is out, they’ve lost main power.” Said Derrick.
“They have sent an emergency tachyon message; it is permeating the beacon networks now!” said Arik.
“Time to go then?” asked Stagg.
“Considering two vessels of a similar class to that we fought over the alien planet are responding, I would say yes.”
Stagg nodded in agreement.
“Helm, pick a beacon we need a place to lay low.”
“I have a system that should be off of their radar.” Said Arik.
“Very well, Helm?” asked Stagg.
The Canada tilted slightly pointing her nose towards the galactic center. Picking up the tachyon stream from the far off beacon the ship hummed, and utilizing the stolen alien technology slipped into FTL leaving behind only a flash of light and a critically damaged Imperial vessel in a highly elliptical orbit around an unknown and unimportant gas giant, where in a far lower orbit escape pods brushed at the atmosphere barely staying aloft.
Everyone on the bridge breathed a sigh of relief as the now familiar red and blue lights danced outside the ships sensors.
The environment slowly began to bleed back into the sealed compartments of the ship, those still exposed remained sealed. Residual heat and excess energy began to slowly bleed off into space. The Canada relaxed.
As the atmosphere returned alarms and warnings began to blare, like far off sounds at first in the thin atmosphere but quickly building towards ear shattering volume.
“Derrick, what’s the damage?” asked Stagg as she took of her helmet wincing at the sounds of the alarms.
“Lots of small stuff, we’ve got melted segments all over the hull and half of the secondary systems are burned out. We’re on backups for a lot of the primary functions as well.” Said the engineer as he studied what the computer was showing him for several moment trying to sort all of it out.
“How long to repair all of it?”
“I can’t even begin to guess, I’ll know in a day. At least two weeks, at least!” said Derrick emphasizing that estimate.
Stagg nodded and turned to the rest of the bridge crew.
“Did we get the codes?” asked Stagg referring to the action they had undertaken which had sparked the entire encounter.
“We did. I have already sorted through most of the data pertinent to our encounter.” Said Arik, “We obtained only low level military access codes I was able to access some mid-level data that was unprotected for processing on the second ship but not much of it. The codes we obtained are equivalent to the secret level of intelligence on our scale from what I can tell.”
Stagg huffed in annoyance but said nothing else. It would have been an unrealistic goal for them to obtain top secret level access.
“Captain, I uh.” Arik fell silent for a moment.
“Yes?” asked Stagg annoyed.
“The Empire is planning to replicate the attack that was performed on Earth. It appears as if the extermination of class C species has accelerated. The next species, C1803 is scheduled for elimination in three months’ time.”
Stagg was silent for a moment.
“We’re a single ship Arik, we can’t stop a genocide.”
“No, but we could give the species a fighting chance! At least warn them that something is going to happen!”
“Later, for now compile all of the data as well as the codes. I want you to begin trolling through all of the military data networks and find anything of even cursory value. We’re going to launch one of the probes with whatever you find.”
“A probe Ma’am” asked Derrick.
“Yes, I figure its time. Set the clock for three years, even the China should be complete by then and they can pick it up.”
“Roger, you want the preliminary damage report now?” asked Derrick as he pulled tablet out of his console and showed it to the Captain.
Stagg slowly shook her head and rubbed at her eyes. “Alright.”