Carinae Sector: 01 - Traders' Scourge - Part 1 - Alien Flight (25 page)

The problem he had with her views was that he had possibly conflicting command objectives and orders to obey as best he could. The prime objective of negating the risk of another pandemic was paramount. The admiral specifically viewed the latest sonar reports from the P8 sonar buoys with real interest. The sea floor at the target location had revealed a massive upwelling and thermal changes as the larger alien object was finally detected. The alien ship was definitely far larger than the carrier he estimated. Disconcertingly the alien ship was accelerating to over fifty knots, now heading north and the bulk of his fleet was too distant to directly stop them.

‘Our fleet has been detected and they are attempting to escape.’ The admiral decided as he gave a series of orders.

The closest ship to the alien ships was an attack submarine that the admiral had patrolling to the north of the target location. He issued orders to the submarine via low frequency radio, and the submarine began to close and take up a position well ahead and slightly to one side of the alien ships. He also ordered all ships to close on the location at emergency speed.

A petty officer called out from his station.

‘Sir the ships are increasing speed to above eighty knots underwater!’ 

Admiral Johnston turned to the low frequency radio operator.

‘Emergency signal to the Sioux City, get them to turn due west at full speed.  Order them into a full shallow water evasion.’

Hopefully the attack submarine could maintain separation and evade a collision. Less than two minutes passed as the tracks for the alien ships merged with the position of the Virginia class attack submarine. Then the submarine track on the display vanished. The sonar operator on the bridge reported.

‘We have lost contact with the transponder on the USS Sioux City sir.’

The radio operator then called out with information.

‘Admiral, I have a partial message, ‘large contact is at 500 meters depth and closing at 75 knots. I am attempting to… ‘, the message then ends Sir.’

The Admiral sat back in shock, the USS Sioux City had a compliment of over one hundred and thirty crew. The warfare officer on the bridge spoke softly.

‘No sign of weapons fire occurring Admiral. I place the loss of the sub as a high speed submerged collision with one of the unknown ships.’

The admiral considered the information then issued further orders.

‘Air warfare officer, I want the carrier ASW and all destroyers to launch their Seahawks armed with mark 55 torpedoes at the target location. Also the Long Beach and the Seattle have those long range guns and we will find out if a shot across their bows gets there attention.’

Within two minutes, both strange looking Zumwalt class cruisers began firing their big vertically mounted guns every thirty seconds at a location ninety kilometers away just north of the last know position of the USS Sioux City. After another five minutes several Seahawk helicopters took off from the carrier and the destroyers, and formed up in pairs before heading east for the target location.

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Captain Narindestat now viewed the damage report from sneak ship four and checked again on the distance of the approaching US fleet. The sneak ship had run down a smaller US underwater craft, no other Trader ships had detected the strange craft, and the solidly built space ship with shields had come off best in the collision. However the ship was badly damaged along the mid section near main power conduits. Sneak ship four had then lost power after flooding for several minutes. The captain did not have time to dock the damaged sneak ship with the main ship, the crew would be taken off the sneak ship and they would hopefully recover the ship later. He had no doubt that his own shielded sneak ships alone could destroy the US fleet, but that was not his intention.

The captain was considering his options further, as sneak ship seven was now docking with sneak ship four and taking off the crew. Suddenly a series of large explosions erupted just to the north of their position.

‘A series of warning shots….’

Considered the captain as he then contacted the Maveen lead probe in the main cargo hold.

‘We have just had a sneak ship disabled by the humans, if we lose one or two more I will have great difficulty getting back to space.’

The probe ignored the captain’s views as it replied.

‘We are not getting involved Captain Narindestat, the whole point of us being passengers is to avoid detection for our mission.’

Captain Narindestat resisted the urge to threaten the probe, instead he continued.

‘You can detect both the weapons fire and the strange approaching craft. Our best information identifies them as specialist hunters of underwater craft, in which case even you will not escape them. I do not want them destroyed I only want them disabled so we can escape.’

The probe now considered the captain’s request for more several seconds, as if it was conferring with other probes again.

‘Very well this is what you need to do as we exit your cargo hold.’

 The captain listened intently as the lead probe stepped through the method they would use to comply with his request. Captain Narindestat then placed further orders.

‘Sneak ships two and six, divert to the north-west and take to the atmosphere. Sneak ships one and three, divert south and also take to the atmosphere. I want all four ships to draw the attention of those US forces and be totally defensive only; as I do not want you to attack the humans at any cost.’

The captain ensured that the bridge recorder was still operating as he spoke again.

‘Maveen lead probe, you and your team may exit the hold, but remember not to destroy the human ships.’

The Illuria had slowed and come with two hundred meters of the surface. However the huge bow wave the ship was creating was being telecast by the one of the now flying sneak ships. The Trader captain extended out and depleted a single cargo hold shield so that it only just kept out the seawater, and he then partly opened the cargo bay doors.

The six Maveen probes exited the cargo hold by flying through the depleted shield, and promptly flew up into the atmosphere for a short distance before diving underwater and streaking west. Captain Narindestat flinched as he calculated the speed of their launch, from either side of his ship’s position; the four patrolling sneak ships began a series of feints and draws at the US fleet.

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Chapter 12

Admiral Johnston could see the four alien ships attempting to flank his surface ships as they flew in well above the speed of sound. The ships were easily the size of a US frigate, and he watched amazed as they flew in for several kilometers and dove out again over several seconds, and never came closer than five kilometers.

‘Captain Stennis, are the electronics people getting recordings of these ships?’

The carrier captain confirmed that data was being recorded as the four ships banked around again. The admiral continued to watch the amazing performance of these strange flying ships banked near the horizon and made another high speed run towards his ships. They did not overfly the US fleet, and Admiral Johnston evaluated their efforts as a series of distractive moves by the aliens.

Admiral Johnston gave an order just for two frigates closest to the alien ships, and the two ships were soon firing warning shots from their main forward guns at the alien ships. The weapons officers on both frigates then provided reports that weapon locks appeared to have a high loss rate with the alien ships. He considered the views he had received from several other taskforce commanders in this scenario, as the US Navy had not been in this situation before.

The consensus of opinion was that if he pushed the aliens hard enough and quickly enough they might surrender. The main objective of preventing another pandemic would be realized if the aliens could be captured and isolated. Also the added advantage was that the surrender would give the US military both full control of the aliens and their impressive technology. The peer recommendation was also to initially avoid nuclear weapons, as the aliens might respond and attack a big city with one of their own nuclear devices that they surely had available.

The admiral noted the reports of main ship continuing to move towards the barrage of fire laid down in front of it by the two US cruisers. The main ship was deeper than the smaller ships, but the mark 55 torpedoes could be manually targeted on objects under several hundred meters of water. The admiral decided that he had given enough of a warning and gave the fateful orders.

‘Air officer, I want the F35’s to attack these four ships to either side of the fleet. All ships to remain on course at full speed for the target location. Also the Seahawks are to launch all torpedoes well inside maximum range, as they may have strong counter measures.’

For several minutes the F35 fighters attempted to bring down the four sneak ships, with both guns and the few missiles that targeted correctly failing to make an impact on the shields of the rapidly evading sneak ships. The sneak ships themselves only targeted attacking missiles, and suddenly the sonar officer shouted out.

‘Sir six smaller ships have just appeared in the waters ahead of the fleet, they are doing one hundred knots.’

The admiral asked for confirmation as the waters ahead of the US fleet erupted and six black cylinders, totally unlike the other space ships, shot hundreds of meters into the air.

A metallic voice boomed in the speakers on the bridges of the US ships.

‘You have attacked two star faring races that merely wish to repair and refuel their ships then leave your planet. You must hold your fire now.’

The now very alarmed admiral responded.

‘All ships use point defense fire now on those six black ships. Seahawks you will launch your missiles now. Long Beach and Seattle are to engage the larger ships to the north.’

A firestorm of phalanx and ICW fire leapt out from the US ships at the six Maveen probes, which began to glow as their shields expanded and absorbed all the weaponry without any damage. As the US fleet launched missiles at the probes, small pure blue beams of light destroyed the missiles as they left the US ships. The two US cruisers attacked sneak ships two and six with everything they had, again with little effect, as the ordinary weapons fire bounced off the space ships. They also easily dodged the armor piercing rounds or shot down the smart munitions from the large caliber vertical gun that the cruisers used as ship killer weapons.

Further east, the dozen Seahawk helicopters each launched their torpedoes, which sped towards the distant under water space ships. The torpedoes were all destroyed as they got close to the sneak ships. Incandescent flashes of light in the water were visible to the Seahawk crew members as their torpedoes either then went dead or exploded well before they reached the space ships. The sneak ships still did not return fire on the US 5
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fleet itself, and merely continued to make high speed passes.

The USS Seattle finally got lucky as a 150mm armor piercing round from the vertical gun mount struck sneak ship two squarely amidships. The Trader sneak ship appeared to shiver mid-air as the shields failed and seconds later the sneak ship tumbled into the ocean. The elation and relief on the bridge of the US aircraft carrier was short lived as the six black space ships flew up higher into the air.

The Maveen response was immediate; a large blue laser shot out from two of the alien probes, and each beam carved into the Zumwalt cruisers amidships where their large vertical 150 mm guns were located. The two US cruisers staggered under the attack and slowed. The other four probes above the US fleet emitted a shrill shriek of electronic noise and their shields seemed to expand like miniature suns. The electronics warfare officer on the bridge of the carrier yelled.

‘Admiral all our electronic systems are fried and communications are gone to other ships. I suspect we have been hit with a massive electro-magnetic pulse.’

The admiral looked out from the bridge as vision returned to his eyes after the flash of light was gone seconds later. Also gone were the three remaining larger space ships and the six smaller black space ships.

‘See if the satellite phones work and order the fleet to turn to the west and reduce speed, this battle is over. I then want a damage report from the cruisers. Also I want status reports on the electronic damage to the fleet. And someone can use a satellite phone to recall those helicopters.’

The bridge of HMAS Sydney was stonily silent as they had just witnessed from a distance a very one sided exchange. The brief battle between the US fleet and the alien ships were over from what they could gather of the diminished electronic traffic now available. The Australian officers noted that only the six smaller black ships had fired at the US 5
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fleet itself during last seconds of the engagement.

Commander Jane Walker prudently ordered both her frigates on a course northeast towards the coast further into Australian territorial waters. As far as the commander could tell the US fleet had attacked and been driven off, with two of their powerful cruisers badly damaged and a submarine probably destroyed. Also one or possibly two of the smaller space ships was now damaged or destroyed. The commander left a message for the US admiral on a satellite phone offering assistance but was not expecting a response soon.

Jane also got the message from the smaller alien ships replayed to the bridge, Steve was right she decided, the aliens had been forced here and would leave of their own accord if given the opportunity. She now carefully prepared her report identifying the total in-ability of the US forces to interdict these space ships successfully. This was highlighted by the fact that the other larger ships had not returned fire on the US fleet. Jane had then added the voice message from the aliens, and finally included the input she had received from both Steve and Douglas the previous day. Jane decided that once she had spoken with the admiral at Fleet West she would place a call to Steve Greene.