Book 4: Chapter 198: Blowback

Book 4: Chapter 198: Blowback

USD: Thirty-Nine hours since hostile fleet incursion.

Location: Meltisar System, MNS Theas Hackjob, CIC

A confirmation signal arrived from Wormy, and Thea confirmed with Engi that all systems were operational and ready for the stress of wormhole generation. She did her own run down through the systems to double-check and found everything reporting ready.

Or rather, ready enough. There were too many additions and improvements to be listed that needed to be made, but all of them came at the expense of time. Considering the situation, time was the one thing they didnt have.

Elis, can you com Admiral of the 6th and ask them if they are ready for transition? Thea asked the other woman.

Two red eyes skewered her with an annoyed look. You literally fired everyone and now you want me to be in charge of security and communications? On a moonlet larger than a fleet battleship?

Im busy dealing with all the physical stuff, Thea countered.

Elis rubbed her forehead and shook her head. Ive done this before with Alex, you know. Im not a comms officer. Let Captain Mackey and his crew off the Alacrity to help.

Thea frowned and looked back at her operations panel that highlighted the docked cruiser in the moonlets main hangar. Shed pulled the engineering and operations crew from the ship since there were things that humans could do that would spare her and Engi from having to go through extra effort and focus, but she had kept those numbers strictly under control.

It wouldnt do to replace one type of stress and focus for another: monitoring them for sabotage and covert actions.

Fine. Call Captain Mackey and have him handle ops for us, Thea muttered.

Elis shook her head as she picked up a hand mic. Youre just like her.

Thea shot her a glance, but turned back to make sure the wormhole drive was ready. Everything had been slapped together in such a frantic fashion that her MainComputer was pinging warning messages everywhere about a more than 1% chance of self-detonation.

Preparations were quickly underway, and an anticipative hum began to fill the entire moonlet. There wasnt anything she could do about that; there hadnt been time to install vibrational baffles. It became loud enough for Elis to shoot her a worried look.

We arent about to explode, are we? Elis asked seriously.

Not too much, Thea replied while gritting her teeth. She transferred a second computronic module to Wormy, but the danger was really just a factor of how quickly things had been put together. Still, the extra processing power allowed more rapid on-the-fly adjustments to the drive as it powered up.

When the green light beside the drives status bar lit up, Thea let out a breath of relief.

Opening communication point at suspected 1st fleet location, Thea declared.

Outside the ship, there was a sudden spark of light and then a small slit in the universe was sliced open. It was small, barely large enough for a person to fit through. That was more than enough to facilitate a high-band signal.

A positional encoding from the 1st fleet arrived almost immediately. The fleet was not at all where Thea had expected, and she was forced to cut the wormhole connection off.

What happened? Elis asked with a frown.New novel chapters are published on

Wrong position. Luckily, such a small wormhole doesnt require a full recharge of the system, Thea replied. A minute later, the hum through the Hackjob began to permeate everything again, but it ended much more quickly.

A second slit opened, and this time, Thea directed a tight beam laser through it to the Aegis. The real-time FTL communication was technically violating a bunch of universal laws, which was the purported reason such technology was banned.

Alexs image flicked into existence on the Hackjobs bridge in the form of a hologram.

Thea smiled. The technology was banned, probably just because of what they were about to accomplish using it.

Big Blues expression wasnt what she expected, and Theas smile slid into a neutral line. Situation Report? Do you have a trajectory for us to come in behind on the Imperial Fleet?

Alex shook her head and began her report without preamble. The First Fleet has held off the Imperial Fleets advance. Weve inflicted heavy casualties on their side and you arent needed here.

Thea and Elis both shared a look and looked back at Alex with surprise.

Thankfully, there was no hint of Ertan interference this time, and a connection blinked into existence with the 3rd fleets flagship. Admiral Bithermoores flag bridge appeared, but things didnt look too good. Smoke wafted out of damaged consoles while sparks sporadically crackled from damaged overhead panels. Everyone visible, including the admiral himself, was wearing sealed skinsuits.

Bithermoores gruff voice crackled from the bridge audio feed. Weve sustained serious damage. Were within missile range, but weve depleted our stores. They seem to have used all of theirs in the first exchange as well.

His voice echoed in the silence for a second as he glanced at one of his tactical screens. The 2nd and 3rd fleets are outnumbered and damaged. Mostly damaged ships thatve been slowed. If we pull away from them, wed be leaving nearly a quarter of our ships behind. Unfortunately, theyre almost up to our rear and Im expecting a long-range laser engagement any minute.

Things were considerably worse than Thea had feared.

Understood, Admiral. Her reply was crisp. She glanced briefly at Elis, who wore an equally grim expression. The 6th fleet is standing by to transit to your position and assist. We are just waiting on authorization.

His gaze flicked back to her, but he didnt object. No doubt he was wondering what the situation with the 1st Fleet was since they were due to assist them, not him. We wont have much time for coordination.

Thea gave a curt nod. Understood, Admiral. Prepare for our arrival. With that, she severed the connection and turned toward her console.

Instead of the familiar hum of the wormhole generator powering back up, a shrill warning alert echoed through the CIC. Frowning, Thea pulled up the diagnostic report from Wormy. Her eyes widened as she scanned through the data; the repeated opening and closings of wormholes had taken a toll and the generator, and several critical components were showing signs of imminent failure.

The estimation was they could only make one more wormhole before the entire system would need a full overhaul, taking at least half a day.

Elis looked at her with concern. Problem?

Thea nodded and looked to Mackey. Captain, contact the 6th fleet and prepare for immediate combat transition. We need to hit them before they break the 2nd and 3rd fleets.

Captain Mackey frowned. The Admiral isnt going to like that. We really should wait for confirmation from High Command. Why dont you open a real time connection with them?

Thea shook her head. The generator is on its last leg; we can only manage one more event horizon before needing at least twelve hours to make repairs. It needs to be a full fleet transition.

The man cursed under his breath before finally nodding. Ill inform them about the situation, but itll be up to the Admiral.

Thea turned her attention to shoring up the stations defenses and equipment. The moonlet wasnt defenseless and had a full array of weapons and even a fortress double d-layer defense field. Even if they didnt intend to engage in the battle, there was a chance with how big the wormhole would be that enemy ships could traverse it from the other side.

If that happened, she needed to cut them down before they oriented themselves and figure out what had happened.

All her checks reported operational status with little else to do. Shed made plans and given them to Engi, but getting the moonlet fully weaponized would just require more time. Not for the first time, she cursed whoever had stalled the engineering teams with useless busy work on the crew quarters and other useless facilities on the station.

After what felt like an eternity, Captain Mackey finally got off his private comm line. The 6th fleet is making ready to transit, Chi Thea.

Thea nodded, then turned to Elis. Security is operational?

The redhead nodded.

Releasing a tense breath, Thea turned to her console and checked the fleet positioning. Ships were tightening up their formation. She shot out a traffic alert and prepared a lane for the fleet to transit, as well as estimated enemy locations and allied movement. Shed be placing them in front of the 2nd and 3rd fleets, allowing them to rendezvous and then engage the Ertan fleet together.

The wormhole generator was capable of modifying the exit velocities of ships entering the wormhole. That required extra dense calculations from Wormy as well as making sure the wormhole was positioned correctly, or ships would enter and then literally crush themselves in a sudden self-destructive fusion.

Final confirmation came through, and Thea let out a sigh of relief. Lets do this.

Elis nodded, and Thea activated the portal.

The massive slit wide enough for the fleet to traverse openedand then a massive flare of radiation and gas slammed into them.

Alarms and warnings began blaring frantically as the moonlet was battered by the blast and shoved aside. The Hackjobs Double D-Layer turned a brilliant blue as it absorbed the massive amount of energy.

That wasnt the main issue, though.

Elis knuckles turned white as she held onto her console. The gravity is sucking us in!