[Azatol]

Chapter 3 – Targul Onca

[img]/threads/images/Graemlins/icon44.gif[/img] 1st Lieutenant Count Dorn
Missile Operations


To: 1st Lieutenant Dorn

The King has authorized construction of two additional Zalau class frigates to guard the colonies. You could be placed on Zalau 003, pending your acceptance of such a transfer. Your response is requested.

As is standard for such transfers, your crew will be allowed to transfer with you to the new posting.


Personnel Division
Weaponry Operational Teams


To: Personnel Division - Weaponry Operational Teams

Regarding the position of missile bay unit leader, I gratefully accept the position and would appreciate your cooperation in the transfer of my team.


To: 1st Lieutenant Dorn

Your transfer time is set for 2401::03::06 1200 - 1800
Onboard the Zalau 003 with Captain James

The ship may be delayed in embarking from the Alba Lulia space station in order to retrofit the new missile design and launching system. The Capital Ship Missile, utilizing fission-fusion H bomb technology, has an estimated yield of 75 megatons and an operational range of 8000 kilometers with maximum range at 10000 k and minimal safe distance of 200 k.


To: 1st Lieutenant Dorn

The Zalau 003 will not need retrofitting because the shipwrighting team onboard the Alba Lulia was provided with the appropriate supplies and specifications for the new missile system.

Personnel Division
Weaponry Operational Teams


“I’m being assigned to the Zalau 003 as chief of weaponry as well, Dorn, the sensors unit is also due for the ship. The thrum of engines will be a nice change from the wimpy orbital control thrusters on this hulk,” Tal said, when I entered his office to tell him the latest news on the Zalau.

“You had something to show me?” I asked.

In the corner, resting on a chair was what looked like a missile, but it was substantially wider and more rectangular than the old design. Two security guards were standing in Tal’s office guarding the missile.

“It’s the new missile design, almost 50% higher yield and more efficient fuel usage which gives it 25% greater maximum range. The loading mechanisms have to be redesigned to carry the heavier missile.

They’ve renamed the Zalau design because of the updates in weaponry, so our new ship will be christened the Targul Ocna. This new missile weighs 20 tons. Onboard the Ocna, there will only be room for about 100 of these babies, and they load 4 to a pallet. On the plus side, these missiles will outrange any and all weaponry we know of.”

“So estimating now, the new missile could destroy a Zalau in three hits and take out this station in seven. That’s certainly an improvement. Have they ran combat tests with the new designs yet.”

“Thats what we will do to pass the time, until the Ocna is ready. They’ve sent up the new fleet command simulator to allow us to test the effect of these new missiles, the weaponry administration would like to see our report on effectiveness in battle. So I have a laptop for you here, preloaded with the program, and lets run even numbers first, 8 Zalau’s vs 8 Ocna’s.”

“I get the Zalau’s?” I said knowing his response.

“Rank has its privleges.”

After the battle we assessed the results.

“You failed to use your range advantage,”

“And you might make a damn fine admiral, you wrecked most of my fleet with your misfits. I count 3 ships left with only three missile bays active between them. One ship had none, another had only one and the third had both. I hate missile dancing, it goes against my naval instincts.”

“Wall formation may be better than V formation to take advantage of range, with V vs V only a few ships are able to exploit a range advantage. Wall vs V would allow concentrated fire against a few targets.”

“The closer you can get in the more chance your missiles have to hit. If only armor could be developed to resist a 75 megaton blast.”

“That’s a tall order sir. Anyway the ramming was a bit different from missile bay duty, it gave my disarmed ships something to do.”

“Indeed they tore me apart, so I responded with my own ramming.”

“I would write up the report as follows: new missiles offer moderate advantage over previous designs, proper tactics are required to use them to their full potential.”

***

So, three months later, Tal, myself and the rest of my unit trekked our way down to the docking facility, where the Targul Ocna had been transferred from shipwrighting. We were carrying our tote bags towards the bay where the Ocna was held when we heard clapping. We rushed into the bay and noticed a big crowd surrounding the ship.

“Give a round of applause for the combat operations group, Tal and his missile unit are transferring to our brightest new warship, congratulations!”

The crowd applauded us all as we entered sheepishly.

“We, the shipwrights of Alba Lulia hope you will respect the Targul Ocna just as much as we did in making her. She will serve you well.”

Another round of applause.

The Captain of the new vessel entered behind us and walked up to the Shipwright leader who had been speaking.

“Thank you, shipwrights, for your fine work on this vessel. We will be in dock for another week to gather our crew and run tests.”

Captain James turned to us and said, “Well lets go on board.”

The ship felt downright claustrophic compared to the station, although in reality it was only a bit less than half the weight of the Alba. It was wider but not as thick, with only three levels.

“Unlike the Alba Lulia, onboard this ship, the three most important things are bridge command, weapon operations and propulsion. I will rely on your team heavily on this ship, and I expect you both to step up to the responsibility.

Our mission is to defend the colony Yukra I from orbit against any attacker, and to prepare, in case full scale war breaks out.

Yukra I is rather close to the sun, so I hope you brought tropical outfits instead of arctic designs, I’ll be hot even with environmental control working hard.

On planet temperatures reach a high of 140, so residents live in habitation domes with air conditioning. Any internal disputes in planet will also be handled by our team, but we have a police detail arriving in two days who will be assigned to such things. The rest of the crew will also be arriving in the next few days.”

***
Two weeks later we were in orbet of Yukra I, environmental control kept temperatures away from the boiling level, but we suffered the heat anyway as the system could not keep us as comfortable as we would like. When we were on the far side of the planet, the ship cooled off fairly quickly, but when we took in the sun’s rays it would heat back up again.

Having a night shift was horrible because you had to try to sleep during the hot days. Equipment faced different stresses than on the station, where cold was the stresser instead. Metal walls and equipment were something we cursed hourly, but we soon became careful what we touched. The crew numbered 140, 50 of these being the police detachement.

The civillian community was planning on flying a small test vessel through the wormholes which marked the boundries of our solar system, if they made it through, the military thought they might have to go follow the civillians to protect them, especially if new colonies were established on the far side of these wormholes.

The civillian community believed that the unidentified object seen months before had come and gone through the wormhole. Soon they would prove to be right as their test vessel slipped right on through the wormhole and back.

If the UFO, or its friends were around on the far end of the wormhole, the military would have to think about forming up a fleet, which would take us away from the oppresively hot assignment we had. We eagerly devoured what news the military dispensed about the civillian project.

Plans were to send a much larger ship through with sensors to detect objects on the far side. Construction would take several months however, because the shipyards of the homeworld were busy constructing colonial ships.

And so the months went by, of drills and police actions. A small rebellion on planet was quelled when the captain threatened to use a missile to obliterate the colony. That was the only time I’ve ever waited on live firing, our missile launcher was loaded and ready to fire on the colony on the captain’s orders. The group turned themselves in, though and I didn’t have to pull the trigger.

Finally, in mid 2401, the Mizil sensor ship began construction on homeworld, and we eagerly awaited the results of their testing. A month later the Mizil set out on its mission.

Soon after, the military was able to make use of shipwrighting facilities on homeworld to build a network of new missile silos featuring the mark II missiles, that would defend the planet from most threats. These weapon platforms, as they were called, were placed all around the planet in defensive installations, and they were manned non-stop.

The Mizil arrived through the wormhole into a system they named Eskirk, and discovered another UFO barely detected on their sensors, but it was there. They pursued it across the Eskirk system, hoping it would lead them to an even greater find.

Instead the Mizil was attacked by this UFO, and it sent a distress signal which woke up the whole military establishment soon after.

PRIORITY ALPHA
EMERGENCY MESSAGE SYSTEM

To: All

All warships are hereby ordered as of 2402::00:03 1300 to form up for fleet action at the Alba Lulia space station. Admiral Winter will be boarding the Zalau 001 to form his command center there. The Toltayan Fleet will embark for the Eskirk system after all ships arrive.

Finally, away from the frying pan, but what was next for us, if not the fire?

I stepped up the missile bay drills trying to hone my unit into a cohesive fighting force as we raced homeward to join up with the others.

And so the game was afoot as the fleet raced towards the Eskirk system by wormhole. I wondered along with everyone else, just what was in store for us.

There was nothing in sight in the Eskirk system so we headed for an unexplored wormhole there, in hopes of finding the murderous aliens that had killed our citizens.

Meanwhile, the military research establishment focussed on establishing a cadre of space marines that could be carried onboard a warship and dropped on a planet to take over. A new hull size was prototyped at a whopping 300 kt. Following the pattern from naval ships, this new hull size was called the destroyer. Now the military would have to design a destroyer and start building them.

In the meantime we speed along, looking for hostile vessels as we approached the unknown wormhole. When we warped through, there were rumors throughout the fleet that scanning teams had picked up a message from the aliens, but as a unit officer I never received any word on that subject, so I can not say either way. It is likely any message would be considered top secret and sent to the diplomatic corp back home.

A hostile warship orbitted a world in the new system which we labelled Nizarum. The world was generating large amounts of radio traffic, which was picked up by our ship comm system on accident, because the frequencies matched. We couldn’t understand any of it, however.

The first space battle of our history began soon after, when we entered orbit of the enemy planet. Sensor software discovered the alien vessel in orbit was not equipped with any weaponry, but designed for some other unknown purpose. The satellites could not be hit by our missiles, because they were too numerous and minor to be tracked by the missile targetting system, they would have to be bypassed until a warship capable of destroying them was built.

So we went after the enemy ship, keeping our distance from the satellites.

As we passed by the planet, we detected missiles launched from it, and turned our attention to destroying the launchers on planet. Thirty missiles were headed for the fleet as I managed my unit team.

“Load and fire, this is for real people,” Pai shouted as Lea operated the controls. She quickly fired when the missile was loaded and ready.

BAWUMP sounded the launcher. “Reload,” I shouted as the machinery was already in motion doing just that.

The comm sounded, it was the captain, “Missile launch detected, we are retreating to attempt to get out of the enemy missile range. We will wait to see the maximum range of their missiles before proceeding.”

“Activate the missile.”

The system display showed the status of the missile’s guidance computer which was booting up. Diagnostics had to be performed on every missile before launch to ensure they were not defective.

I could feel the sudden jerk as we turned and fled the oncoming missiles, which I knew were there but could not see.

“Fleet has launched its payload of missiles,” the captain said on comm. “750 megatons of power, hoorah! Those launchers will be dead in the water soon enough.”

The Captain was still thinking in naval terms, I thought to myself. The enemy’s launchers were on solid ground.

“Hostile missiles pursuing, all ships are holding ground,” the sensors chief Michael said on comm.

“This is combat operations commander Tal, structural integrity team prepare for possible missile impacts. Assume defensive stations for impact. We do not know the range on the enemy missiles, so prepare for anything.”

Expected time of impact came and gone.

“The enemy missiles lost thrust at 8000 kilometers out, estimate maximum range at that figure. Our missiles have hit their targets on planet. Damage: moderate. Three missile silos are now offline,” Michael said.

“Fire at range of 9000 kilometers, missile teams assume attacking positions,” Tal ordered.

“2 rounds in the pallet remaining,” Hal said.

Engines fired up taking us in closer to assigned firing distance.

“Fire!” I said as we closed in.

BAWUMP!

We waited a few minutes as our second salvo hit the planet.

“4 remaining silos.”

“Some missiles are reported as ineffective at 9000 kilometers due to targetting distant parts of the planet. Fire at 8000 kilometers and return to 9000 while reloading.”

BAWUMP!

“All silos have been destroyed, some collateral damage on planet,” Michael said.

“Fleet requests pursuit of alien vessel, full thrust,” Captain James said.

The hum of the engines could be felt throughout the ship as Pai loaded another missile and prepared it, and we chased after the vessel that had escaped when we turned our attention to the planet.

We were alongside the Torgul Onca 004 in pursuit of the enemy vessel, with the rest of the fleet behind us.

A new pallet of missiles was loaded from below, replacing the empty one. The pallet loading mechanism closed with a sharp click.

004 and our ship fired at the same time on the vessel. We were firing at maximum range. The rest of the fleet closed in and fired after us. The first two volleys destroyed the ship and the rest of the missiles were deactivated. The Torgul Onca 001, our vessel, had its first kill.

Captain James had a single star painted alongside the ship’s name and designation. The 1st battle of Nizarum VII was a complete success, mostly because of the new missile design.

The fleet was ordered to blockade the planet and prevent any reinforcements from arriving.

To: All

These aliens, who call themselves the Amon’krie Continuum, wished to offer peace to us, after having ruthlessly killed the civillian vessel Mizil. We will not stand for such barbarity and therefore I have extended to the continuum two options: Surrender, or Conquest.

King Aya the 8th calls on you to serve your kingdom. In another year and a half the ground invasion of the Amon’krie homeworld will commence. New technologies must be developed in order to create a Space Marine Corps. In the meantime you will destroy all warships of the continuum that show themselves.